Targeting NET Framework 4 5 via Visual Studio 2010

Question

Today I installed the  NET Framework 4 5 on my machine expecting to be able to use it from Visual Studio 2010  since it s just a minor update that should t pose problems for Visual nbsp Studio nbsp 2010  Unfortunately I am not  even manually removing certain 4 0 and adding the corresponding 4 5 assemblies resulted in the original 4 0 assemblies still being referenced in the project   Is it possible to target version 4 5 from Visual nbsp Studio nbsp 2010 and if yes  how  I d really like to use the ribbons

User · Answer

FYI  if you want to create an Installer package in VS2010  unfortunately it only targets  NET 4  To work around this  you have to add NET 4 5 as a launch condition   Add the following in to the Launch Conditions of the installer  Right click  View  Launch Conditions    In  Search Target Machine   right click and select  Add Registry Search    Property  REGISTRYVALUE1 RegKey  Software Microsoft NET Framework Setup NDP v4 Full Root  vsdrrHKLM Value  Release   Add new  Launch Condition    Condition  REGISTRYVALUE1 gt    378389  InstallUrl  http   www microsoft com en-gb download details aspx id 30653 Message  Setup requires  NET Framework 4 5 to be installed    Where   378389    NET Framework 4 5  378675    NET Framework 4 5 1 installed with Windows 8 1  378758    NET Framework 4 5 1 installed on Windows 8  Windows 7 SP1  or Windows Vista SP2  379893    NET Framework 4 5 2  Launch condition reference  http   msdn microsoft com en-us library vstudio xxyh2e6a v vs 100  aspx

User · Answer

There are pretty limited scenarios that I can think of where this would be useful  but let s assume you can t get funds to purchase VS2012 or something to that effect   If that s the case and you have Windows 7  and VS 2010 you may be able to use the following hack I put together which seems to work  but I haven t fully deployed an application using this method yet     Backup your project file    Download and install the Windows 8 SDK which includes the  NET 4 5 SDK  Open your project in VS2010  Create a text file in your project named Compile 4 5 CSharp targets with the following contents    Or just download it here - Make sure to remove the   txt  extension from the file name     lt Project DefaultTargets  Build   xmlns  http   schemas microsoft com developer msbuild 2003  gt        lt  -- Change the target framework to 4 5 if using the   NET 4 5  configuration -- gt       lt PropertyGroup Condition      Platform        NET 4 5    gt           lt DefineConstants Condition     DefineConstants        gt              TARGETTING FX 4 5          lt  DefineConstants gt           lt DefineConstants Condition     DefineConstants       and    DefineConstants     TARGETTING FX 4 5   gt                DefineConstants  TARGETTING FX 4 5          lt  DefineConstants gt           lt PlatformTarget Condition     PlatformTarget         gt           lt TargetFrameworkVersion gt v4 5 lt  TargetFrameworkVersion gt       lt  PropertyGroup gt        lt  -- Import the standard C  targets -- gt       lt Import Project    MSBuildBinPath  Microsoft CSharp targets    gt        lt  -- Add  NET 4 5 as an available platform -- gt       lt PropertyGroup gt          lt AvailablePlatforms gt   AvailablePlatforms   NET 4 5 lt  AvailablePlatforms gt       lt  PropertyGroup gt   lt  Project gt   Unload your project  right click -  unload   Edit the project file  right click -  Edit   csproj   Make the following changes in the project file   a  Replace the default Microsoft CSharp targets with the target file created in step 4   lt  -- Old Import Entry -- gt   lt  --  lt Import Project    MSBuildBinPath  Microsoft CSharp targets    gt  -- gt    lt  -- New Import Entry -- gt   lt Import Project  Compile 4 5 CSharp targets    gt    b  Change the default platform to  NET 4 5   lt  -- Old default platform entry -- gt   lt  --  lt Platform Condition      Platform           gt AnyCPU lt  Platform gt  -- gt    lt  -- New default platform entry -- gt   lt Platform Condition      Platform           gt  NET 4 5 lt  Platform gt    c  Add AnyCPU platform to allow targeting other frameworks as specified in the project properties   This should be added just before the first  lt ItemGroup gt  tag in the file   lt PropertyGroup Condition     Platform       AnyCPU   gt       lt PlatformTarget gt AnyCPU lt  PlatformTarget gt   lt  PropertyGroup gt          lt ItemGroup gt         Save your changes and close the   csproj file  Reload your project  right click -  Reload Project   In the configuration manager  Build -  Configuration Manager  make sure the   NET 4 5  platform is selected for your project  Still in the configuration manager  create a new solution platform for   NET 4 5   you can base it off  Any CPU   and make sure   NET 4 5  is selected for the solution  Build your project and check for errors  Assuming the build completed you can verify that you are indeed targeting 4 5 by adding a reference to a 4 5 specific class to your source code   using System  using System Text   namespace testing       using net45check   System Reflection ReflectionContext     When you compile using the   NET 4 5  platform the build should succeed   When you compile under the  Any CPU  platform you should get a compiler error   Error 6  The type or namespace name  ReflectionContext  does not exist in the namespace  System Reflection   are you missing an assembly reference

User · Answer

I have been struggling with VS2010 DNFW 4 5 integration and have finally got this working   Starting in VS 2008  a cache of assemblies was introduced that is used by Visual Studio called the  Referenced Assemblies    This file cache for VS 2010 is located at  Reference Assemblies Microsoft Framework NetFramework v4 0   Visual Studio loads framework assemblies from this location instead of from the framework installation directory   When Microsoft says that VS 2010 does not support DNFW 4 5 what they mean is that this directory does not get updated when DNFW 4 5 is installed   Once you have replace the files in this location with the updated DNFW 4 5 files  you will find that VS 2010 will happily function with DNFW 4 5

User · Answer

Each version of Visual Studio prior to Visual Studio 2010 is tied to a specific  NET framework   VS2008 is  NET 3 5  VS2005 is  NET 2 0  VS2003 is  NET1 1  Visual Studio 2010 and beyond allow for targeting of prior framework versions but cannot be used for future releases  You must use Visual Studio 2012 in order to utilize  NET 4 5

User · Answer

From another search  Worked for me    You can use Visual Studio 2010 and it does support it  provided your OS supports  NET 4 5   Right click on your solution to add a reference  as you do   When the dialog box shows  select browse  then navigate to the following folder   C  Program Files x86  Reference Assemblies Microsoft Framework  Net Framework 4 5  You will find it there

[visual-studio-2010] Targeting .NET Framework 4.5 via Visual Studio 2010

Examples related to visual-studio-2010

Examples related to visual-studio

Examples related to .net-4.5