MSBuild output in subfolder for each targetframework when using OutDir

msbuild, visual-studio-2017

Solution

The property that is now used is `OutputPath`, however setting it from the CLI makes it a global property and overrules the automatic appending of the output path. The workaround is to make an intermediate property that is global and consume it from the project.

Add this to your project file inside a `PropertyGroup`:

<OutputPath>$(BaseOutputPath)</OutputPath>

Then you can set this property globally when calling the build command:

martin.ullrich@martins-imac:~/tmp$ dotnet build /p:BaseOutputPath=bin/foo

  tmp -> /Users/martin.ullrich/tmp/bin/foo/netstandard1.4/tmp.dll
  tmp -> /Users/martin.ullrich/tmp/bin/foo/netstandard1.6/tmp.dll

The problem here is that the SDK tries to change the `OutputPath` property based on `TargetFramework` and `AppendTargetFrameworkToOutputPath`. But if the value is specified via CLI, the project logic cannot overwrite it.

Also note that `BaseOutputPath` is actually used in the SDK defaults (defaulted to `bin\`), but it will try to append the configuration name by default..

Problem

When using the new SDK style csproj format, it is possible to use a `<targetframeworks>` element for a semicolon-separated list of target frameworks to build the project for. This results in one subfolder per target framework in the build output folder: However, when passing the OutDir property on the msbuild command line, it does NOT create the subfolders, and the built assemblies are all placed in the same folder. Command line that works, but doesn't allow output location: `msbuild projectfile.csproj` Command line that selects output directory, but places built assemblies in same folder (effectively overwriting the target framework assemblies that are built first): `msbuild projectfile.csproj /p:OutDir=buildtemp` Is there a way to place the build output in a non-default folder while still retaining the targetframwork subfolders?

Original source