Unable to build module for solution with multiple projects

[click2install]

When creating a new IoT Edge solution with a single IoTEdgeModule project with the AzureIoTEdgeApp everything works as expected.

If however, you have multiple projects in the same solution it does not build from the Dockerfile as expected due to it not having the parent directory available in its context, for example;

 -/ AzureIoTEdgeApp1
 -/ ClassLibrary1
 -/ IotEdgeModule1
 -/ AzureIoTEdgeApp1.sln

For this to work the most successful approach is to set the data context within module.json to be the root directory, i.e. the parent of the module.json and the location of the solution file as ../. This mostly works, however you end up with a warning from the dockerfile of:

/app/AzureIotEdgeApp1/AzureIotEdgeApp1.iotedgeproj : warning NU1503: Skipping restore for project '/app/AzureIotEdgeApp1/AzureIotEdgeApp1.iotedgeproj'. The project file may be invalid or missing targets required for restore. [/app/AzureIotEdgeApp1.sln]

The only approach to not encounter that warning is to have the Dockerfile (and its context) in the same folder as the module.json file. Using that approach removes the warning above, but prohibits multiple projects within a solution as the Docker context is not able to access them from the current folder.

Current Behavior

As outlined in the summary above, it's not possible to have multiple projects within an IoTEdgeModule solution and have it build within the usual flow of tooling in Visual Studio or using the Dockerfile from the shell.

Expected Behavior

A simple approach to allowing multiple projects (class libraries) within a solution and have a simple build solution.

Steps to Reproduce - Flow 1

1. Create a new IoTEdgeModule
2. Add a class library and link it as a project reference to the edge module
3. Build IoT Edge Modules
4. Dockerfile output will show Skipping project "/ClassLibrary1/ClassLibrary1.csproj" because it was not found.

Steps to Reproduce - Flow 2

1. Create a new IoTEdgeModule
2. Set "contextPath": "../" in module.json
3. Add a class library and link it as a project reference to the edge module
4. Build IoT Edge Modules
5. Dockerfile output will show /app/AzureIotEdgeApp1/AzureIotEdgeApp1.iotedgeproj : warning NU1503: Skipping restore for project '/app/AzureIotEdgeApp1/AzureIotEdgeApp1.iotedgeproj'. The project file may be invalid or missing targets required for restore. [/app/AzureIotEdgeApp1.sln]

Is there a simple approach, or documented guidance to this workflow as it doesn't seem like an extraordinary developer experience or use case.

[bilalsellak]

Investigating this

[marianan]

@click2install thanks for reporting this issue. At this time setting the image.contextPath is the only way - https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/iot-edge/how-to-configure-module-build-options?view=iotedge-2020-11

[click2install]

Thanks @marianan that's what we've done to workaround the issue (flow #2 above). The challenge that poses though is the references from the build target aren't included so we've had to include those manually (in a temporarily linked project) so there isn't a runtime exception from assembly load.

[github-actions]

This issue is being marked as stale because it has been open for 30 days with no activity.

[AlexandrStarov]

Will this bug be fixed?