VS2022 and Dependency and all child nodes

Question

i have created a small project in .net core 6 with VS2022. i found dependency node has few child nodes and those are

1) Analyzers
2) Frameworks
3) Assemblies
4) Packages

a) i like to know what is Analyzers and what it does ? how to test Analyzers's functionality to learn it
b) what is Frameworks nodes ? why it is there?

my project has no packages.json file.....why it is missing ? in which kind of project packages.json file found and required ?

please guide me. thanks

Answer 1

The Dependencies node is dynamically generated by the IDE to category your dependencies.

Those found under Analyzers are code analyzers. If you're using the newer SDK format and .NET 5+ then it ships with analyzers that check your code while you're writing and compiling. The analyzers do basically the same thing that the old FxCop stuff did. Analysis might include properly cleaning up IDisposable objects, using String.Equals instead of String.Compare, etc. The standard analyzers are defined here. In addition you can install NuGet packages that are marked as analyzers. They would also be added under this node. For the most part you don't need to touch any of these. If you want to customize the rules then refer to the documentation I linked that explains how to suppress rules based upon your requirements.

The Frameworks node is where frameworks reside and it is exclusively for the IDE to manage. You don't need or do anything under here. It just helps to separate these dependencies, that are controlled by your target framework selection, from those that you can manage.

Packages.json? That's an NPM thing and has nothing to do with this node. If you have a web app that uses NPM then you will have such a file but those are client side and not server side which is what this node is showing.

If your project uses NuGet for dependencies (most .NET apps do) then they will be found under Packages. While you can managed (to a limited degree) NuGet packages from here you will normally use the NuGet Package Manager for the solution or project. This node just shows you the dependencies you have and their dependencies, if any.

The Assemblies node shows you binary references you have. The only things you'll generally see in here are framework references that you added that are not part of the Framework node and binary references you have added.

There is also a Projects node when applicable that shows you the dependencies your project has on other projects in the same solution.

Answer 2

In addition to @Michael Taylor in regards to packages, see Microsoft.Build.CentralPackageVersions.

The Microsoft.Build.CentralPackageVersions MSBuild project SDK allows project tree owners to manage their NuGet package versions in one place. Stock NuGet requires that each project contain a version. You can also use MSBuild properties to manage versions.