ItemGroup element (MSBuild)

Article
03/10/2023

Contains a set of user-defined Item elements. Every item used in an MSBuild project must be specified as a child of an ItemGroup element.

Syntax

<ItemGroup Condition="'String A' == 'String B'"
           Label="Label">
    <Item1>... </Item1>
    <Item2>... </Item2>
</ItemGroup>

Attributes and elements

The following sections describe attributes, child elements, and parent elements.

Attributes

Attribute	Description
`Condition`	Optional attribute. Condition to be evaluated. For more information, see Conditions.
`Label`	Optional attribute. Identifies the `ItemGroup`.

Child elements

Element	Description
Item	Defines the inputs for the build process. There may be zero or more `Item` elements in an `ItemGroup`.

In addition to the generic Item element, ItemGroup allows child elements that represent types of items, such as Reference, ProjectReference, Compile, and others as listed at Common MSBuild project items.

Parent elements

Element	Description
Project	Required root element of an MSBuild project file.
Target	Starting with .NET Framework 3.5, the `ItemGroup` element can appear inside a `Target` element. For more information, see Targets.

Example

The following code example shows the user-defined item collections Res and CodeFiles declared inside of an ItemGroup element. Each of the items in the Res item collection contains a user-defined child ItemMetadata element.

<Project xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">
    <ItemGroup>
        <Res Include = "Strings.fr.resources" >
            <Culture>fr</Culture>
        </Res>
        <Res Include = "Dialogs.fr.resources" >
            <Culture>fr</Culture>
        </Res>

        <CodeFiles Include="**\*.cs" Exclude="**\generated\*.cs" />
        <CodeFiles Include="..\..\Resources\Constants.cs" />
    </ItemGroup>
...
</Project>

In a simple project file, you normally use a single ItemGroup element, but you can also use multiple ItemGroup elements. When multiple ItemGroup elements are used, items are combined into a single ItemGroup. For example, some items might be included by a separate ItemGroup element that's defined in an imported file.

ItemGroups can have conditions applied by using the Condition attribute. In that case, the items are only added to the item list if the condition is satisfied. See MSBuild conditions

The Label attribute is used in some build systems as a way to control build behaviors. You can use it only in declarations, as a way to create more understandable MSBuild scripts, or as a control setting to affect build actions.

Share via