How can I ensure that appsettings.dev.json gets copied to the output folder?

c# asp.net configuration asp.net-core web-deployment
Alex G. picture Alex G. · Jul 4, 2016 · Viewed 14.8k times · Source

I have three configuration files, one for each environment:

  1. appsettings.json -> production
  2. appsettings.dev.json -> development
  3. appsettings.stg.json -> staging

If I set ASPNETCORE_ENVIRONMENT to dev, I get a runtime exception complaining about not being able to find appsettings.dev.json. I tried adding 

"copyToOutput": [
  "appsettings.dev.json"
]

to the buildOptions section in project.json but it doesn't seem to have any effect.

Is there another way I can force appsettings.dev.json to be copied to the output directory?

Answer

Jess picture Jess · Apr 11, 2018

In my case, appsettings.json is not being copied for unit tests.

If you right click the file and choose Properties, this dialog will come up. Change Build Action to Embedded resource and the file will be copied to the bin folder for the unit test to pick up.

enter image description here

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