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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-20T17:38:35+00:00

So, being completely obsessive compulsive, I was digging around in the .csproj file for

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So, being completely obsessive compulsive, I was digging around in the .csproj file for one of my assemblies and was looking at the schema for the XML. I noticed in the <ItemGroup>, the various .dll files are referenced using an element called <Reference Include="..." />.

Out of curiosity, I did some digging and found that I can change things up a bit by modifying it with an included <Name> element. Like so …

  <Reference Include="Microsoft.CSharp">
      <Name>System.Dynamics</Name>
  </Reference>

I of course expected this to crash everything, but behold, when I reloaded the project and compiled, everything ran just fine.

Is this just there for aesthetics? Or am I doing damage by changing names around? Are there any long term effects of this? I did not experience any build, runtime, or editor issues from doing this.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    I think it’s just the display name of the reference.

    Edit: The MSBuild schema defines the Reference\Name element as “Friendly display name (optional).”

    The schema for MSBuild is located here: C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\Microsoft.Build.xsd

    Also, check out the MSBuild Reference.

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