Do SourceGenerators currently need to be netstandard2.0?

[msedi]

I wanted to try our SourceGenerators and followed the projects in VS 16.9.0 (official version - no preview). Both, my testapp and the SourceGenerator were <TargetFramework>.net5.0</TargetFramework> but it didn't work. When checking the few examples I found that the SourceGenerator is marked with netstandard2.0.

Is this currently a requirement or am I doing something wrong. If this is necessary it would be nice if it would be documented somewhere.

[jmarolf]

All analyzers and generators must target netstandard2.0

[msedi]

@jmarolf: Thanks for the info. I'm curious, is this documented somewhere? And what is the reason for this?

[sharwell]

And what is the reason for this?

The tools run under both .NET Framework 4.7.2 (IDE scenarios, msbuild) and .NET Core (dotnet build, dotnet msbuild). netstandard2.0 is the newest framework which ensures both scenarios will work.

[msedi]

@sharwell. That makes sense. Thanks for the info.