Get a property value out of an MSBuild Task

Question

My scenario is as follows.

I have a .targets file that does some stuff, for example,

<Project xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">
  <!-- Some UsingTask here -->
  <PropertyGroup>
    <CustomProperty1>MyFirstValue</CustomProperty1>
    <CustomProperty2>MySecondValue</CustomProperty2>
  <Target Name="AfterResolveReferences">
    <MSBuild Projects="MyProjectLocation\MyProject.csproj" Properties="CustomProperty1=$(CustomProperty1);CustomProperty2=$(CustomProperty2)" Targets="Rebuild" />
    <Message Text="CodeGenerated = $(CodeGenerated)" />
  </Target>
  <Target Name="CodeGeneratedSpecificStuff" Condition="$(CodeGenerated) == 'true'">
    <!-- Stuff happens -->
  </Target>
  <!-- More targets and bits and pieces -->
</Project>

And MyProject.csproj looks like this:

<Project DefaultTargets="Build" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003" ToolsVersion="4.0">
  <!-- Some property groups with some properties -->
  <!-- Also Compile includes etc as expected in a .csproj file -->
  <Target Name="BeforeBuild" DependsOnTargets="GenerateCode">
    <ItemGroup Condition="$(CodeGenerated) == 'true'">
      <Compile Include="MyGeneratedCode.cs" />
    </ItemGroup>
  </Target>
  <Target Name="GenerateCode">
    <MyCodeGenerationCustomTask MyOperationalProperty="$(CustomProperty1)">
      <Output TaskParameter="CodeGenerated" PropertyName="CodeGenerated" />
    </MyCodeGenerationCustomTask>
  </Target>
</Project>

I am trying to bubble the "CodeGenerated" property that comes from my MyCodeGenerationCustomTask in the .csproj file to get out into my .targets file.

So far I've tried:

Passing in the "CodeGenerated" property as empty at the MSBuild call in the .targets file.
Specifying an "Output" element under the MSBuild task (it doesn't work as the MSBuild task doesn't have a "CodeGenerated" property...)

I have also tried setting "Outputs" on both the "BeforeBuild" target and on the "Project" element in the .csproj file to "$(CodeGenerated)" (MSBuild didn't complain about the existence of the Outputs tag on the Project element, so I thought I might as well give it a go), but the value does not bubble up to the .targets file. In the .targets file I did also change the MSBuild task to look more like this:

<MSBuild Projects="MyProjectLocation\MyProject.csproj" Properties="CustomProperty1=$(CustomProperty1);CustomProperty2=$(CustomProperty2)" Targets="Rebuild">
  <Output TaskParameter="TargetOutputs" PropertyName="CodeGenerated" />
</MSBuild>

But as I would expect this just contained the list of generated files from the MSBuild task.

Important to note is the code generation is working fine, and the CodeGenerated property within the .csproj file functions correctly and conditionally includes the cs file for compilation.

Is this possible? Am I just hitting my head against a brick wall? Or am I missing some MSBuild magic?

I really want to avoid checking the specific .cs location at every level above for its existence.

Possible duplicate of [How to use an Output parameters from a target in msbuild](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5078759/how-to-use-an-output-parameters-from-a-target-in-msbuild) — Troopers, Aug 22 '18 at 07:18
Just trying out the ideas in that post, but my problem is part of the Visual Studio build process so I'm not sure I can output from "BeforeBuild" to the code that simply calls "MSBUILD Projects=". I will however give it a go. — Skintkingle, Aug 22 '18 at 07:32

Get a property value out of an MSBuild Task

0 Answers0