Cake build - NugetRestore with PackageReferences

Question

I have a Visual Studio 2017 solution which contains .NET Standard, .NET Core, and .NET Framework projects. My .NET Framework 4.6.2 project is using PackageReferences in the .csproj file - instead of a packages.config.

This seems to be the new way of specifying NuGet packages and will allow future migration to .NET Standard 2.0 (I hope). https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/nuget/consume-packages/package-references-in-project-files

csproj:

<ItemGroup>
    <PackageReference Include="LanguageExt.Core">
        <Version>2.1.1</Version>
    </PackageReference>
    <PackageReference Include="Microsoft.SqlServer.Dac">
          <Version>1.0.3</Version>

VS displays cool icons:

Anyway, the solution compiles fine under Visual Studio but fails with build errors when compiling via cake.

Databases\DatabaseInstaller.cs(5,27): error CS0234: The type or namespace name 'Dac' does not exist in the namespace 'Microsoft.SqlServer' (are you missing an assembly reference?) [C:\code\Core.AcceptanceTesting\Core.AcceptanceTesting.csproj]

Are these newer "PackageReferences" supported by cake build?

Here's a segment from my cake script:

// NuGet restore packages for .NET Framework projects (and .NET Core projects)
Task("NuGet-Restore")
    .IsDependentOn("Clean")
    .Does(() =>
    {
        NuGetRestore(solutionFile);
    });

// NuGet restore packages for .NET Core projects only
Task("DotNetCoreRestore")
    .IsDependentOn("NuGet-Restore")
    .Does(() =>
    {
        var settings = new DotNetCoreRestoreSettings
        {
            ArgumentCustomization = args => args.Append("/p:Version=" + versionPrefix + "-" + versionSuffix)
        };
        DotNetCoreRestore(settings);
    });

// Build our solution
 Task("Build")
    .IsDependentOn("DotNetCoreRestore")
    .Does(() =>
    {
        DotNetCoreBuild(
            solutionFile,
            new DotNetCoreBuildSettings()
            {
                ArgumentCustomization = args => args.Append("/p:Version=" + versionPrefix + "-" + versionSuffix),
                Configuration = configuration
            });
    });

Answer 1

I downloaded your repo and got it building. Use the build definition below. Reason it works in Visual Studio is because it uses MSBuild and Nuget.exe. Don't call DotNetCoreX-commands on NET Framework.

Task("Build")
    .IsDependentOn("NuGet-Restore")
    .Does(() => {
        MSBuild(solutionFile);
});

Answer 2

What version of Cake are you using? The .Net Core aliases were recently updated to reflect some changes in the API surface. What happens if you try the following:

var settings = new DotNetCoreRestoreSettings
{
    ArgumentCustomization = args => args.Append("/p:Version=" + versionPrefix + "-" + versionSuffix)
};

DotNetCoreRestore(solutionFile, settings);

i.e. include the path to the Solution File.

As per this example:

https://github.com/cake-contrib/Cake.Recipe/blob/develop/Cake.Recipe/Content/build.cake#L128