Project organization

Question

Trying to organize my project to make easier to manage.

Running the debugger throws an error indicating that the JSON file cannot be found. VS is looking in the debug directory of the project for the JSON file. It seems odd that it wants the JSON file located there. Hence, I figure I must have a setting wrong somewhere.

I added reference paths to the Project for several folders thinking this would solve the issue, but it didn't.

Thanks for any assistance you may share,
Lance

Answer 1

I would not use spaces in folder names and with that provide a better structure for a project which of course is for conceptual idea of a project structure. Fill in other folders accordingly.

In regards to a file not found make sure to set copy to output folder. See my Microsoft article

Answer 2

For the record, seems prudent to include what can be done if you had a .NET Core 5 or higher .NET Core Framework.

Make directory in the project file MakeDir Task

<Target Name="MakeJsonFolder" AfterTargets="Build">  
	<MakeDir Directories="$(OutDir)Json" />  
</Target>	  

Then Copy Task, below is a stock example

<Project xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">  
  
    <ItemGroup>  
        <MySourceFiles Include="a.cs;b.cs;c.cs"/>  
    </ItemGroup>  
  
    <Target Name="CopyFiles">  
        <Copy  
            SourceFiles="@(MySourceFiles)"  
            DestinationFolder="c:\MyProject\Destination"  
        />  
    </Target>  
  
</Project>  

Answer 3

Thank you for the answer and I enjoyed your article.

Mimicking your structure, I have this.

Struggling a bit (Hopefully, there isn't a glaring omission on my part), so I chose to Copy Always for all JSON files.

After I clean and rebuild I have the necessary structure and files.

But the error indicates that the folder structure is ignored as it wants it in the root of the build directory.

Regards,
Lance