Question

I want to write nuspec for MEF plugin.
I can copy xxx.dll to content directory, like below.

<files>
  <file src="Alhambra\bin\Release\Plugins\Alhambra.Plugin.SqlServer.dll" target="content\Plugins\Alhambra.Plugin.SqlServer.dll" />
  <file src="Alhambra\bin\Release\Alhambra.dll" target="lib\Alhambra.dll" />
</files>

but I can’t set file property in user project to copy output directory.

Thanks for any suggestions or code snippets.

Answer 1

My approach would be to add the plugin to the project as a separate file. For that you need an install script (see NuGet docs for this).

My solution for this is the following script:

param($installPath, $toolsPath, $package, $project)

Function add_file($file)
{
    $do_add = 1
    foreach($item in $project.DTE.ActiveSolutionProjects[0].ProjectItems)
    {
        if ($item -eq $file)
        { $do_add = 0 }
    }
    if ($do_add -eq 1)
    {
        $added = $project.DTE.ItemOperations.AddExistingItem($file)
        $added.Properties.Item("CopyToOutputDirectory").Value = 2
        $added.Properties.Item("BuildAction").Value = 0        
    }
}
add_file(<file1>)
add_file(<file2>)

Of course, when the user uninstalls the package, you need to clean up:

param($installPath, $toolsPath, $package, $project)

Function remove_file($file)
{
    foreach($item in $project.DTE.ActiveSolutionProjects[0].ProjectItems)
    {
        if ($item.Name -eq $file)
        { 
          $item.Delete() 
        }
    }
}
remove_file(<file1>)
remove_file(<file2>)