@JanKrivanek This seems pretty close. WithDisableTransitiveProjectReferences I can disallow references to the downstream projects (in my case, to the libraries which are used by ToolProject). But what I actually need is disabling references to the ToolProject itself, too.

@vladd - If I understand you correctly - you are interested only in copying the build outputs, without exposing the reference public surface to other project(s) in the build - is that correct? There is no short-cut reference metadata support for those requirements. You'd need to write a custom target yourself (that copies the content of the OutputPath after build to the directory of interest). But perhaps theArtifacts output layout might help you achieve what you are looking for?

@JanKrivanek

you are interested only in copying the build outputs, without exposing the reference public surface to other project(s) in the build - is that correct?

Exactly, this is my goal.

You'd need to write a custom target yourself (that copies the content of the OutputPath after build to the directory of interest).

Well, this is perhaps going to be tricky, as I would need to specify the build order dependency somehow, right?

You should still be able to use theReferenceOutputAssembly to guarantee the build order. The deps copying would however be on you.

But please try to first have a look onArtifacts output layout to see if it can help you achive your goal.

See, that's the thing..., in most Plug-in or tools based project structure, we don't need the reference but want the build order and the copying of dependencies.

I struggled with this problem quite a lot and IMHO, settingReferenceOutputAssembly=False should ensure build order. TheProjectReference should also respectPack,Publish andCopyToOutputDirectory.

Unfortunately, build order seems to be not enough, because I need the project output to be copied to the referencing project’s output folder.

Build order ensures that the dependencies will always be built first and then you can gather the build outputs and copy them manually into the referencing project.

Just like here:CommunityToolkit/dotnet#220

See theDynamically Pack... commit. Especially the...GetBuildOutputs.targets file which shows how to gather the outputs and the...Packaging.targets file which shows how to use it.

Well, it's not that easy, since the referencing project may be a library as well, so we need it to be a transitive dependency for copying. Sorry for being unclear in my previous answer.

The customary<ProjectReference> means from user's point of view 2 things:

• the public classes from the referenced project are available in the referencing project
• the output files of the referenced project appear in the output folder of the executable project which is
  • either referencing project itself if it's executable;
  • or, if the referencing project is a library, in every executable project referencing (maybe indirectly) this library.

My need is to remove the first bullet while keeping the second (because the tool will be started by the referencing library as a process). (I need the referenced project to be a separate tool, because it has different bitness.)

Exactly what I was trying to solve in my own projects. I don't want to reference the files in Code but want them in output/publish directory.

In my own projects, I never went beyond 2 levels of transitive references, so, I can't confidently say that this might work beyond that but it's a starting point.

You can look at thebinlog to see where and how the transitive references flow and then hook these targets at appropriate places and add the transitive Items either inBuildOutputPerTarget orBuildOutput items inside theGetBuildOutput... targets. This will get you the entire output including transitive references.