The default XML namespace of the project must be the MSBuild XML namespace

Question

I cloned the ASP.NET Core SignalR Repo locally, and try opening the solution from within the following environment.

IDE

Microsoft Visual Studio Enterprise 2015
Version 14.0.25431.01 Update 3
Microsoft .NET Framework
Version 4.6.01055

DOT NET CLI

λ dotnet --info
.NET Command Line Tools (1.0.0-preview2-1-003177)

Product Information:
 Version:            1.0.0-preview2-1-003177
 Commit SHA-1 hash:  a2df9c2576

Runtime Environment:
 OS Name:     Windows
 OS Version:  6.1.7601
 OS Platform: Windows
 RID:         win7-x64

I end up seeing a lot of these kinds of error messages:

..\Repos\SignalR\src\Microsoft.AspNetCore.SignalR\Microsoft.AspNetCore.SignalR.csproj : error : The default XML namespace of the project must be the MSBuild XML namespace. If the project is authored in the MSBuild 2003 format, please add xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003" to the element. If the project has been authored in the old 1.0 or 1.2 format, please convert it to MSBuild 2003 format. ..\Repos\SignalR\src\Microsoft.AspNetCore.SignalR\Microsoft.AspNetCore.SignalR.csproj

I want to know how to fix this the correct way.

Answer 1

The projects you are trying to open are in the new .NET Core csproj format. This means you need to use Visual Studio 2017 which supports this new format.

For a little bit of history, initially .NET Core used project.json instead of *.csproj. However, after some considerable internal deliberation at Microsoft, they decided to go back to csproj but with a much cleaner and updated format. However, this new format is only supported in VS2017.

If you want to open the projects but don't want to wait until March 7^th for the official VS2017 release, you could use Visual Studio Code instead.