Support Statement: .NET Build Standards, Framework, Core, and Common

Owned by Mark Juras
Last updated: Jul 16, 2019
2 min read

Q: When the tool generates any class library projects that the WPF/Winform projects reference, are they .Net Standard or .Net Framework?

.Net Standard:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/standard/net-standard

Image that might be able to let you visualize it better:

https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/getfile/981310

Basically, .Net Standard is the commonality between .Net Framework, .Net Core, etc.  There exist some functionality in .Net Framework that is not present in .Net Core, and there exist some functionality in .Net Core that is not present in .Net Framework.  There does not exist any functionality in .Net Standard that does not exist in .Net Framework or .Net Core though.  So you can use .Net Standard libraries in both .Net Framework AND .Net Core.

 Any projects that aren’t directly WPF, Winforms, or ASP.Net we’re trying to build in .Net Standard going forward, and in our .Net solution class library projects we’re in the process of removing any .Net Framework only functionality.  Additionally, all new class library projects in our .Net Solution are .Net Standard.

 Basically, my question was:  If the tool generates any class library projects that the WPF/Winform projects reference, are they .Net Standard or .Net Framework?

A: I believe we reference .NET Framework. 

We have a gmSL routine responsible for setting framework version based on target VS Version.  But you can modify it to target something else.  

The question now is this: how do these different standards impact csproj and cs file content in terms of literal assembly references, framework version numbers, and namespaces/classes.   Also are there different build settings, tools, or conventions used to target these different standards.  Once these are matters are understood, they may be integrated with the upgrade solution and ongoing DevOps processes. 
I typically answer these types of questions by inspecting what Visual Studio does when you create and build empty projects using various types of templates.