MSBuild SDKs

The MSBuild project SDKs are used to configure and extend your build.

What SDKs are available?

Microsoft.Build.Traversal

Supports creating traversal projects which are MSBuild projects that indicate what projects to include when building your tree. For large project trees, they are replacements for Visual Studio solution files.

Microsoft.Build.NoTargets

Supports utility projects that do not compile an assembly.

Microsoft.Build.Artifacts

Supports staging artifacts from build outputs.

Microsoft.Build.CopyOnWrite

Enables Copy on Write on Windows Dev Drive and ReFS for faster file copies.

Microsoft.Build.RunVSTest

Hooks VSTest to the Test target, allowing running tests concurrently with the build via msbuild /t:Build;Test.

How can I use these SDKs?

When using an MSBuild Project SDK obtained via NuGet (such as the SDKs in this repo) a specific version must be specified.

Either append the version to the package name:

<Project Sdk="Microsoft.Build.Traversal/2.0.12">
  ...

Or omit the version from the SDK attribute and specify it in the version in global.json, which can be useful to synchronise versions across multiple projects in a solution:

{
  "msbuild-sdks": {
    "Microsoft.Build.Traversal" : "2.0.12"
  }
}

Since MSBuild 15.6, SDKs are downloaded as NuGet packages automatically. Earlier versions of MSBuild 15 required SDKs to be installed.

For more information, read the documentation.

What are MSBuild SDKS?

MSBuild 15.0 introduced new project XML for .NET Core that we refer to as SDK-style. These SDK-style projects looks like:

<Project Sdk="Microsoft.NET.Sdk">
  <PropertyGroup>
    <TargetFramework>net46</TargetFramework>
  </PropertyGroup>
</Project>

At evaluation time, MSBuild adds implicit imports at the top and bottom of the project like this:

<Project Sdk="Microsoft.NET.Sdk">
  <Import Project="Sdk.props" Sdk="Microsoft.NET.Sdk" />

  <PropertyGroup>
    <TargetFramework>net46</TargetFramework>
  </PropertyGroup>

  <Import Project="Sdk.targets" Sdk="Microsoft.NET.Sdk" />
</Project>

Contributing

This project welcomes contributions and suggestions. Most contributions require you to agree to a Contributor License Agreement (CLA) declaring that you have the right to, and actually do, grant us the rights to use your contribution. For details, visit https://cla.microsoft.com.

When you submit a pull request, a CLA-bot will automatically determine whether you need to provide a CLA and decorate the PR appropriately (e.g., label, comment). Simply follow the instructions provided by the bot. You will only need to do this once across all repos using our CLA.

This project has adopted the Microsoft Open Source Code of Conduct. For more information see the Code of Conduct FAQ or contact opencode@microsoft.com with any additional questions or comments.