I'm using the Nuget Package Explorer to create some nuget packages. I've managed to do so just building a project in Release mode in VS and adding both the dll and pdb files to the package.
So far so good, but when I add the package to another project and try to step into the code while debugging, it will step over it instead.
I understand that I need to build and add the Debug dll and pdb to my package if I want to step into the code while debugging. I'm not sure though how to add these to the package I've already create, which already contains the Release dll and pdb file, which are named the same.
Any thoughts?
My thoughts are, NuGet packaging is a lot about conventions.
There is no problem in packaging same namespaces and same names for different platforms (as in
lib/net40/mydll.dll
,lib/net35/mydll.dll
etc in the same package), as NuGet will filter registered dependencies by platform.Building several versions for the same platform seems unconventional, this discussion is biased towards making a package per build. That doesn't mean you can't do it, but you should first ask yourself if you should.
That said, if your debug and release builds are very different (conditional compiling etc) this might useful though. But how will end-users choose Release or Debug when installing your package?
An idea could be, one version per build configuration. Both can be installed into the project. To do that, either add a targets file to your package or build a powershell install script that adds conditional references directly in the target project file, if you want something less basic than whatever MsBuild can do for you.
Example of the first tactic: Create a .target file (in your package, create a
build
folder and then createbuild\YourLib.targets
with the following contents):Providing you created debug and release folders (platform folder is optional), the build output will effectively change depending on configuration - provided packet consumers have conventional configuration names, but you could always extend the condition logic a bit with $(Configuration).Contains etc or just put that in the package readme
Inspired by @Tewr I've found a cumbersome but a working solution.
Create a nuget with the following file structure:
The targets file content:
The dlls in lib folder will be automatically added as references creating the following in the project file:
Once you build the project for the first time, the target will copy the release and debug version from tools\release and tools\debug folders to lib\net\release and lib\net\debug folders. In the end, it will delete the lib\net\$(Configuration) folder
Enjoy (or not - I personally don't like the solution).