Dotnet publish looking for dependency in Debug directory instead of Release

Question

I have a project Project.Api that references another project Project.DomainModel. When I build the API project for release by running

dotnet restore && dotnet build -c Release

It builds successfully. However, when I try to publish

 dotnet publish -c Release -o published --no-restore --no-build ./Project.Api

I get this error:

/usr/local/share/dotnet/sdk/2.1.302/Sdks/Microsoft.NET.Sdk/targets/Microsoft.NET.Publish.targets(168,5): error MSB3030: Could not copy the file "xxxx/Project.DomainModels/bin/Debug/netcoreapp2.1/Project.DomainModels.dll" because it was not found. [xxxx/Project.Api/Project.Api.csproj]

According to the error, it's looking for the referenced project in the Debug directory, but of course it won't find it there because it will be in the Release directory.

Project.Api.csproj file looks like this:

<Project Sdk="Microsoft.NET.Sdk.Web">
  <PropertyGroup>
    <TargetFramework>netcoreapp2.1</TargetFramework>
  </PropertyGroup>
  <ItemGroup>
    <PackageReference Include="AutoMapper" Version="8.0.0" />
  </ItemGroup>
  <ItemGroup>
      <ProjectReference Include="..\Project.DomainModels\Project.DomainModels.csproj" />
  </ItemGroup>
</Project>

Any idea why it is looking in the Debug directory instead of Release? Getting this on both a Mac and linux machine.

what about Build section in project properties ? What actually do you have there ?Which output location did you specify for release mode ? — isxaker, Dec 11 '18 at 08:36
On both projects the release path is `bin\Release\netcoreapp2.1\`. I can confirm that that's where the artefacts actually go as well. — Sello Mkantjwa, Dec 11 '18 at 08:48
or probably one of your references(a .dll) was added from debug directory ? — isxaker, Dec 11 '18 at 08:53
I thought so too, but this is the only ref and DOmainModels has none — Sello Mkantjwa, Dec 11 '18 at 08:57
but what do you have actually at your `*.csproj` file at `` ? Or you have `Publish` ? — isxaker, Dec 11 '18 at 10:05
What is the project structure? Share us the demo solution which could reproduce your issue. — Edward, Dec 12 '18 at 05:26
@SoheilAlizadeh removing --no-build does indeed work. Thanks for that! I do a build right before, sure I shold not need to build again? — Sello Mkantjwa, Dec 12 '18 at 09:58
I think it was just some weird state that the project was in. Went to the last working commit, redid the whole thing on a different branch and it worked :/ — Sello Mkantjwa, Dec 12 '18 at 09:59
in my case I had neglected to add the referenced project to the solution file and that caused `dotnet build -c Release` and `dotnet publish -c Release` to pick up the debug build — Mark Adamson, Oct 12 '19 at 22:06

score 6 · Answer 1 · answered Feb 18 '20 at 18:33

tl;dr Create a Release publish profile with a <LastUsedBuildConfiguration>Release</LastUsedBuildConfiguration> property and also specify the publish profile in the dotnet publish command, i.e.,

dotnet publish -c Release /p:PublishProfile=Release -o published --no-restore --no-build ./Project.Api

I know this is an old question, but in case anyone else runs into it, I had a similar issue, and in my case, the solution was to make sure I had a Release publish profile, or create one if I did not. The publish profile contains a LastUsedBuildConfiguration property with a value of Release, which seems to be the key issue.

Essentially, dotnet publish -c Release says we will build and then publish the Release build configuration. When we also specify --no-build, we are saying to skip the build step. So, we specify a build configuration to use, then tell it not to build.

Enter the LastUsedBuildConfiguration property. This property can be set in a publish profile, or is set dynamically by MSBuild during the build step. I haven't delved too far into the SDK, but here's what I suspect is happening. Since we're skipping the build step, LastUsedBuildConfiguration is not being set and is therefore not available to dotnet publish. In this case, dotnet publish assumes its default build configuration, which is Debug.

To test this, I ran the following dotnet publish commands:

When I run this command, it looks in bin/Debug (no PublishProfile specified):

dotnet publish -c Release --no-restore --no-build

When I run this command, it looks in bin/Debug (PublishProfile, but no -c Release):

dotnet publish --no-restore --no-build /p:PublishProfile=Release

When I run this command, it finally looks in bin/Release (both -c Release and PublishProfile):

dotnet publish -c Release --no-restore --no-build /p:PublishProfile=Release

Only in the last case, when both -c Release and /p:PublishProfile=Release was dotnet publish using the bin/Release directory.

That sorted it for me, hope it helps someone else out as well.

Soheil Alizadeh · Answer 2 · 2018-12-12T07:39:52.423

5

Your mistake is --no-build, with this flag you don't let to dotnet for creating project's references dll file.

UnSuccessful publish:

dotnet publish -c Release -o published --no-restore --no-build .\App\

CSC : error CS0006: Metadata file 'C:\Path\App.Domain\bin\Release\netstandard2.0\App.Domain.dll' could not be found [C:\Path\App\App.csproj]

Successful publish:

dotnet publish -c Release -o published --no-restore  .\App\

 App.Domain -> C:\Path\App.Domain\bin\Release\netstandard2.0\App.Domain.dll
 App -> C:\Path\App\bin\Release\netcoreapp2.1\App.dll
 App -> C:\Path\App\bin\Release\netcoreapp2.1\App.Views.dll
 App -> C:\Path\App\published\

Answer's sample dotnet --info:

.NET Core SDK (reflecting any global.json):
 Version:   2.1.500
 Commit:    b68b931422

Runtime Environment:
 OS Name:     Windows
 OS Version:  10.0.17763
 OS Platform: Windows
 RID:         win10-x64
 Base Path:   C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\2.1.500\

Host (useful for support):
  Version: 3.0.0-preview-27122-01
  Commit:  00c5c8bc40

Read more about MSBuild, I hope this answer could help you to better understating dotnet build process.

edited Dec 12 '18 at 07:39

answered Dec 11 '18 at 14:45

Soheil Alizadeh

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Thanks Soheil, not sure if Im missing something, but right before I do `dotnet publish` I do `dotnet build -c Release`, presumably this should create the dependecy dlls (which it does and places in the Release directory). It's just that the release is not looking in that directory but rather the Debug directory. – Sello Mkantjwa Dec 12 '18 at 09:45
@SelloMkantjwa could you push your codes on github? – Soheil Alizadeh Dec 12 '18 at 10:03
I did and it works - thanks. Take a look at https://stackoverflow.com/questions/53720172/dotnet-publish-looking-for-dependency-in-debug-directory-instead-of-release/53726576?noredirect=1#comment94333343_53720172. It does not really answer the root question, which is _why it is looking in the Debug directory instead of Release?_ PS the error that you get and the one that I get are not the same. – Sello Mkantjwa Dec 12 '18 at 12:52
@SelloMkantjwa I got it. – Soheil Alizadeh Dec 12 '18 at 13:08
@SelloMkantjwa, May it'is an issue in the dotnet system, do you want report that? – Soheil Alizadeh Dec 12 '18 at 13:10

Dotnet publish looking for dependency in Debug directory instead of Release

2 Answers2