Building using dotnet build fails for .NET Standard library project

[jpierson]

I'm using the latest pre-release of GitVersionTask (4.0.0-beta0011) on a .NET standard library project and it seems to work from Visual Studio 2017 but not from the command line using dotnet build. I'm targeting netstandard1.2.

I wasn't sure whether this would work at all. I started off looking around for an implementation that installs a GitVersion package as a DotnetCliToolReference in an SDK csproj file. With nothing conclusive from that or from other .NET Core related issues (ex. #647) I figured I should just try adding the package reference and see what it does. I was happy at first to see it was working when building the solution from Visual Studio but building using dotnet build gives me the following error.

Microsoft (R) Build Engine version 15.1.545.13942
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\me.nuget\packages\gitversiontask\4.0.0-beta0011\build\GitVersionTask.targets(45,5): error MSB4062: The "GitVersionTask.WriteVersionInfoToBuildLog" task could not be loaded from the assembly C:\Users\me.nuget\packages\gitversiontask\4.0.0-beta0011\build\GitVersionTask.dll. Could not load file or assembly 'Microsoft.Build.Utilities.v4.0, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL'. The system cannot find the file specified. Confirm that the declaration is correct, that the assembly and all its dependencies are available, and that the task contains a public class that implements Microsoft.Build.Framework.ITask. [C:\Users\me\source\myproj\src\MyProj\MyProj.csproj]
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\1.0.0-rc4-004771\Sdks\Microsoft.NET.Sdk\build\Microsoft.NET.Sdk.targets(92,5): error : Cannot find project info for 'C:\Users\me\source\myproj\src\MyProj\MyProj.csproj'. This can indicate a missing project reference. [C:\Users\me\source\myproj\src\TestCore\TestCore.csproj]

Build FAILED.

C:\Users\me.nuget\packages\gitversiontask\4.0.0-beta0011\build\GitVersionTask.targets(45,5): error MSB4062: The "GitVersionTask.WriteVersionInfoToBuildLog" task could not be loaded from the assembly C:\Users\me.nuget\packages\gitversiontask\4.0.0-beta0011\build\GitVersionTask.dll. Could not load file or assembly 'Microsoft.Build.Utilities.v4.0, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL'. The system cannot find the file specified. Confirm that the declaration is correct, that the assembly and all its dependencies are available, and that the task contains a public class that implements Microsoft.Build.Framework.ITask. [C:\Users\me\source\myproj\src\MyProj\MyProj.csproj]
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\1.0.0-rc4-004771\Sdks\Microsoft.NET.Sdk\build\Microsoft.NET.Sdk.targets(92,5): error : Cannot find project info for 'C:\Users\me\source\myproj\src\MyProj\MyProj.csproj'. This can indicate a missing project reference. [C:\Users\me\source\myproj\src\TestCore\TestCore.csproj]
0 Warning(s)
2 Error(s)

Time Elapsed 00:00:01.09

According to the documentation:

Support for CoreCLR with dotnet build is coming soon.

Is there anywhere I can follow along with the work being done for getting GitVersionTask or some form of automated solution that works for .NET library projects?

[JakeGinnivan]

@onovotny any thoughts? :)

[clairernovotny]

Yeah, it cannot work with dotnet build. dotnet build uses the CoreCLR and the tasks are currently compiled for the desktop framework. You have to use msbuild.exe /t:restore,mbbuild.exe /t:build, and msbuild.exe /t:pack as the equiv of dotnet restore, dotnet build and dotnet pack.

Once GitVersion has .NET Standard versions of the underlying assemblies, we can create .NET Standard build task and support it easily. I believe LibGit2Sharp now has this support as NerdBank.GitVersioning has a .NET Standard version now that uses LibGit2Sharp.

[TAGC]

Which of GitVersion's dependencies are currently blocking progress on the migration?

[asbjornu]

@TAGC: Not sure. Here's a dump of GitVersion's packages folder:

• ApprovalTests.3.0.11
• ApprovalUtilities.3.0.11
• Caseless.Fody.1.4.2
• FluentDateTime.1.13.0
• Fody.1.29.4
• GitTools.Core.1.2.1-beta0001
• GitTools.Testing.1.1.1-beta0001
• ILRepack.2.0.12
• JetBrainsAnnotations.Fody.1.0.5.0
• LibGit2Sharp.0.23.0-pre20160922233542
• LibGit2Sharp.NativeBinaries.1.0.160
• Microsoft.CodeAnalysis.Analyzers.1.1.0
• Microsoft.CodeAnalysis.CSharp.1.3.2
• Microsoft.CodeAnalysis.Common.1.3.2
• Microsoft.CodeAnalysis.VisualBasic.1.3.2
• ModuleInit.Fody.1.5.9.0
• Mono.Cecil.0.9.6.4
• NSubstitute.1.10.0.0
• NUnit.3.6.0
• NUnit3TestAdapter.3.7.0
• Newtonsoft.Json.8.0.3
• ObjectApproval.1.3.0
• PepitaPackage.1.21.4
• Shouldly.2.7.0
• System.Collections.4.3.0
• System.Collections.Immutable.1.3.1
• System.Diagnostics.Debug.4.3.0
• System.Globalization.4.3.0
• System.Linq.4.3.0
• System.Reflection.Metadata.1.4.2
• System.Resources.ResourceManager.4.3.0
• System.Runtime.4.3.0
• System.Runtime.Extensions.4.3.0
• System.Threading.4.3.0
• TestStack.ConventionTests.3.0.0
• Visualize.Fody.0.4.5.0
• YamlDotNet.3.8.0

I assume most of these need to be ported to .NET Standard before GitVersion can?

[conniey]

@asbjornu Yes... or an alternative would have to be found for them.

The ones that do not exist are:

• ApprovalTests.3.0.11 (Add support for .NET Core approvals/ApprovalTests.Net#162)
  • ApprovalUtilities.3.0.11
  • ObjectApproval.1.3.0
• Fody.1.29.4 (Fody mscorlib not found on .NETStandard project Fody/Fody#280)
  • Caseless.Fody.1.4.2
  • Visualize.Fody.0.4.5.0
  • ModuleInit.Fody.1.5.9.0
  • JetBrainsAnnotations.Fody.1.0.5.0
• LibGit2Sharp.0.23.0-pre20160922233542 (PR: Target .NET Standard 1.3 libgit2/libgit2sharp#1318)
  • GitTools.Core.1.2.1-beta0001 (Uses LibGit2Sharp)
  • GitTools.Testing.1.1.1-beta0001
• PepitaPackage.1.21.4
• TestStack.ConventionTests.3.0.0 (Make the nuget package compatible with NETCore TestStack/TestStack.ConventionTests#77)
• YamlDotNet.3.8.0 (PR: Port to .NET Standard aaubry/YamlDotNet#244)

[dazinator]

Just hit this when running dotnet test on an xunit project, that has a project reference to the project with the gitversion task. I am not sure what the equivalent of dotnet test is for msbuild, however managed to workaround this by:

1. Build the test project first using msbuild.
2. dotnet test --no-build to execute the tests.

[el2iot2]

Just saw on Twitter that the PR for LibGit2Sharp got merged. That brings this issue one step closer to resolution, it would seem.

[el2iot2]

Yep after a quick survey, only PepitaPackage and ApprovalTests don't have netstandard support?

[dazinator]

I don't think ApprovalTests should matter as this is a build time only dependency surely - (i.e for running tests) so shouldn't be a dependency that is forced onto consumers?

[dazinator]

Also just a note to say that even though calling msbuild instead of dotnet cli will provide a workaround for some scenarios, for others, like dotnet ef I can't find any equivalent msbuild commands so this remains a problem.

[dazinator]

I have looked at the dependencies and filtered down the relevent ones for gitversiontask which are:

  <package id="GitTools.Core" version="1.2.1-beta0001" targetFramework="net40" />
  <package id="ILRepack" version="2.0.13" targetFramework="net40" />
  <package id="LibGit2Sharp" version="0.23.0-pre20160922233542" targetFramework="net40" />
  <package id="LibGit2Sharp.NativeBinaries" version="1.0.160" targetFramework="net40" />
  <package id="YamlDotNet" version="3.8.0" targetFramework="net40" />

[dazinator]

Notable we would need to add support for netcore to GitTools.Core first.

[dazinator]

So the blockers seem to be:

• GitTools.Core
• ILRepack: https://github.com/gluck/il-repack/blob/master/ILRepack/packages.config

YamlDotNet has a .NET standard version of the package that I assume we could switch too. https://www.nuget.org/packages/YamlDotNet.NetCore/