"the outputpath property is not set for this project" error

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I have a multi project solution in Visual Studio 2008. I just added a new Configuration called Release-VersionIncrement to the solution, specifying "use release" configuration as baseline. All project files were updated with that configuration. However, when I am trying to compile a specific project using this configuration, I get the following error:

Error 5 The OutputPath property is not set for this project. Please check to make sure that you have specified a valid Configuration/Platform combination. Configuration='Release-VersionIncrement' Platform='AnyCPU' C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v3.5\Microsoft.Common.targets 539 9 DataConversion

What's happening here? The project compiles fine in Release or Debug configuration.

Hotel answered 8/7, 2009 at 20:0 Comment(2)

I struggled with this for hours until I realized that the drop down list in the TFS build definition has "Any CPU" rather than "AnyCPU" !!!! – Disrelish 24/4, 2014 at 3:22

In VS2012, the drop down in the build configuration is "Any CPU", but inside the .csproj file is "AnyCPU", so in Jenkins or command line, use "AnyCPU" will work. – Subtend 31/3, 2016 at 14:51

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94

Usually this happens when the OutputPath property of the project file is blank. Project files are just MSBuild files. To edit in Visual Studio: Right click on the project, pick "Unload project" then right click on the unloaded project and select "Edit ...".

Look for the Release-Versionincrement property group. It should look something like

<PropertyGroup Condition=" '$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Release-VersionIncrement|AnyCPU' ">
  <OutputPath>bin\Release-VersionIncrement\</OutputPath>
  <DefineConstants>TRACE</DefineConstants>
  <Optimize>true</Optimize>
  <DebugType>pdbonly</DebugType>
  <PlatformTarget>AnyCPU</PlatformTarget>
  <CodeAnalysisUseTypeNameInSuppression>true</CodeAnalysisUseTypeNameInSuppression>
  <CodeAnalysisModuleSuppressionsFile>GlobalSuppressions.cs</CodeAnalysisModuleSuppressionsFile>
  <ErrorReport>prompt</ErrorReport>
</PropertyGroup>

The important one there it the OutputPath, does it exist for your project file? If not add it and try again.

Guaranty answered 9/7, 2009 at 3:27 Comment(7)

Sayed, Yes, I checked that, and the project file for the project that is having issues has the OutputPath property. – Hotel 9/7, 2009 at 12:41

If the output path is correct and you're still receiving this error, you might have references to assemblies or other projects that don't exist any longer. Clean out the old references. That was my experience. – Aphid 13/1, 2010 at 21:37

I just stumbled onto this error, and had to modify the project file directly. Even though the project properties page said "Any CPU" the property was set to blank initially and I picked up a Platform=BPC setting from my environment variables. After I fixed that and set/reset the properties page from Any CPU to x86 and back, it still wouldn't build, claiming the platform was now 'x86' (?!?). Sure enough, I followed the steps here and found it was now set to x86, so I manually edited it and now everybody's happy again. Thanks guys! – Muns 21/9, 2010 at 19:30

My project file had the expected PropertyGroup, with a non-empty OutputPath, and I was getting this error. The only thing I noticed was that the PropertyGroup for this particular configuration was the first element under the root node in the file, and the Condition attribute didn't have a leading and trailing space, unlike all of the other configuration Conditions. At this point, I moved this element below some of the other configurations (not sure why it would matter, was just trying stuff), and added the whitespace in the condition. After this it worked. Not sure which made the difference. – Centaur 11/12, 2012 at 14:57

@sethflowers solution worked for me. It would build fine locally, but TeamCity would not build my new Configuration until I made the changes in Seth's comment – Rouble 12/3, 2013 at 17:50

I had another issue. I used SlowCheetah to create my config transformations for my windows project. The configurations didn't had the whitespace like @sethflowers suggested. I added those but that didn't help. I saw that there was another property group between the configurations. So sorted that out (just placed the property group below the project configuration property groups) and then the problem was gone. Thanks for all the suggestions here. It saved me time!!! – Piled 23/7, 2013 at 7:1

Deffo try it with \p:Platform="AnyCPU" instead of \p:Platform="Any CPU". That worked form me! Was looking at this for ages! – Bogan 7/10, 2013 at 11:3

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I have also seen this error when our build agent was configured to run platform "Any CPU" (with spaces as displayed in Visual Studio) rather than "AnyCPU" (one word as specified in the project file).

Wristband answered 1/9, 2010 at 12:23 Comment(4)

I ran into the same problem, it appears that on the solution level, "Any CPU" is valid, but on the project level, it is "AnyCPU". In other words, msbuild myproj.sln /p:Configuration=Debug /p:Platform="Any CPU" was fine, however when building the project, I had to omit the space in Any CPU: msbuild myproj.proj1.csproj /p:Configuration=Debug /p:Platform=AnyCPU to suppress the Outputpath property error. – Desired 26/1, 2015 at 12:37

Unbelievable, and what a PITA for CI configuration. I've been struggling with this for days. – Interstice 16/9, 2015 at 15:57

I had this error when I couldn't build on the main build server and the alternate I selected passed "Any CPU" instead of "AnyCPU". After checking there were some différences in the version numbers of MSBUILD and other software. Thanks for your answer, – Prospectus 8/10, 2015 at 16:1

I can't believe the space was the culprit! – Enwind 3/12, 2016 at 20:30

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I had the same problem when I used MSBuild first. My solution is: use the OutputPath property definitely. Like this:

msbuild XXX.csproj /p:OutputPath=bin\Debug.

Oocyte answered 25/2, 2010 at 9:29 Comment(2)

This solved my issue for a TeamCity Azure Cloud Service build. +1 – Margherita 5/2, 2016 at 8:57

Likewise for me with VSO's CI Build. – Plunge 17/8, 2017 at 19:35

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In our case we were running a build script on our HP developer boxes. HP have some environment variables they've set up for their own purposes and one of them is PLATFORM (used, apparently, for "HP Easy Setup").

Deleting the PLATFORM environment variable worked.

You could also future-proof your build script by specifying the platform, i.e.
msbuild /p:Platform=AnyCPU.

Vivia answered 30/3, 2012 at 14:18 Comment(1)

This caught me on my new HP laptop - thanks @Vivia - this wouldn't have occurred to me. – Deadhead 4/12, 2013 at 17:27

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If Visual Studio specifically complains that "Platform='BPC'" then you can easily fix this by removing the "Platform" environment variable.

Delete this bad boy.

Now restart Visual Studio and you are good to go.

Nothing answered 6/6, 2013 at 23:32 Comment(0)

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Like "Richard Dingwall" hinted, the problem is related to VS using the display version of "Any CPU" instead of the MSBuild version which actually reads "AnyCPU"

Go into Build/New Build Definition or Edit Build Definition -> Process -> Configurations to build, open the configuration selection dialog and in "Platform" instead of selecting "Any CPU", manually add "AnyCPU"

Jacaranda answered 16/8, 2011 at 14:46 Comment(0)

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As was said, OutputPath must be set AND it must be placed before <Import Project="$(WixTargetsPath)" /> in .wixproj file

Pinnule answered 16/4, 2014 at 15:19 Comment(1)

This one was related to my issue, I added a new configuration for a wix project after I created it and the new configuration was added at the end of the file so all related PropertyGroups to that new configuration were placed AFTER this import, moving them to the top, right next to the other ones, made it work for me. – Ency 15/3, 2017 at 22:46

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I've removed Platform environment variable (was BNB or smth like that). The problem is gone.

Anosmia answered 19/11, 2010 at 13:35 Comment(1)

Unfortunately even after removing the Platform environment variable it reqires a full reboot! – Umbrella 21/5, 2013 at 15:44

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I was adding the x64 platform to my solution today, when I ran into this issue.

In my case, the error read:

Built $/ProjectDirectory/ProjectName.csproj for default targets. c:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\Microsoft.Common.targets (484): The OutputPath property is not set for project ProjectName.csproj'. Please check to make sure that you have specified a valid combination of Configuration and Platform for this project. Configuration='Debug' Platform='x64'. You may be seeing this message because you are trying to build a project without a solution file, and have specified a non-default Configuration or Platform that doesn't exist for this project.

I knew the OutputPath should be fine, since this was an existing, working VS solution. So I moved to the next hint--"a valid combination of Configuration and Platform".

Aha! Visual Studio is trying to build Configuration='Debug', Platform='x64'. Looking at my project file, I realized that x64 was not listed as one of the possible platforms. In other words, I had the below entries (shortened):

  <PropertyGroup Condition=" '$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Debug|x86' ">
      <PlatformTarget>x86</PlatformTarget>
      <OutputPath>bin\x86\Debug\</OutputPath>  
      . . .  
  </PropertyGroup>
  <PropertyGroup Condition=" '$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Release|x86' ">
      <PlatformTarget>x86</PlatformTarget>
      <OutputPath>bin\x86\Release\</OutputPath>    
      . . .
  </PropertyGroup>

Easy fix then: just add x64 entries!

I copy/paste'd the x86 entries, and changed them to use x64. Notice I also modified the paths so these don't overwrite x86 builds:

  <PropertyGroup Condition=" '$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Debug|x64' ">
      <PlatformTarget>x64</PlatformTarget>
      <OutputPath>bin\x64\Debug\</OutputPath>    
      . . .
  </PropertyGroup>
  <PropertyGroup Condition=" '$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Release|x64' ">
      <PlatformTarget>x64</PlatformTarget>
      <OutputPath>bin\x64\Release\</OutputPath>    
      . . .
  </PropertyGroup>

Fuge answered 14/11, 2012 at 2:14 Comment(0)

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I strugged with this for a while and then also unloaded, built, and then reloaded the offending project in the solution, and then MSBuild functioned correctly.

Roble answered 20/5, 2011 at 17:43 Comment(0)

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In my case (VS2010) I removed string in the "OutputPath" box that is on "Build" tab and left it blank. Then I rebuilt the solution. Build was successful and VS has inserted current directory "./" into the "OutputPath". I replaced current directory "./" with my path ("bin\x64\Release\" -- suffice to say that this is exact folder path that was VS was complaining in the first place) and rebuild was successful again.

Guncotton answered 11/12, 2012 at 19:25 Comment(0)

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As Scott S, I've had to delete the "Platform" environment variable.

Then restart VS, and it's ok : no more error message...

Arlenaarlene answered 4/5, 2015 at 13:3 Comment(1)

This worked for me when I deleted the platform that I had specified in my Build vNext MSBuild step too. – Willodeanwilloughby 5/1, 2016 at 17:16

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The issue had to do with my project configuration. Here is the scenario:

Solution A references:

Project X references Project Y
Project Y

Solution B (the one I am trying to build) references:

Project X Project Z

My solution was to create a configuration with the same name for Solution A, rebuild it, and then rebuild Solution B. This fixed the problem.

Hotel answered 9/7, 2009 at 14:23 Comment(1)

I was encountering the same error and this work-around was the only thing that worked for me. Basically, I had a solution platform configuration "Win32" which builds a silverlight project with the platform configuration "Any CPU" and also a webapplication project with the platform configuration "x86" that hosts the silverlight project. I had to add a new project platform configuration to the silverlight project, "x86" (and keep the old one as the default configuration) in order for msbuild to work as expected. – Garett 5/3, 2011 at 5:55

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I had this same error message. It was caused by having a reference to a project that was unloaded and not required by the linker (otherwise it would have failed at compile time). Removing the offending reference solved the issue.

Saveall answered 15/5, 2012 at 22:9 Comment(0)

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In my case the OutputPath was set property in the project files. But unloading, reloading and then rebuilding fixed it.

Isobar answered 17/11, 2010 at 8:21 Comment(0)

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If anyone is getting this one in his NCrunch logs, check if the PropertyGroup defining the values 'Debug'/'Release' and 'AnyCPU'/'x86' located before the property groups using those values in their condition.

<PropertyGroup>
    <!-- this one first -->
    <Configuration Condition=" '$(Configuration)' == '' ">Debug</Configuration>
    <Platform Condition=" '$(Platform)' == '' ">AnyCPU</Platform>
    <XXX>...</XXX>
  </PropertyGroup>

<PropertyGroup Condition="'$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Debug|x86'">
    <XXX>...</XXX>
</PropertyGroup>

<PropertyGroup Condition="'$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Debug|AnyCPU'">
    <XXX>...</XXX>
</PropertyGroup>

Worked for me.

Quilting answered 14/11, 2016 at 10:19 Comment(1)

yea this was worked for me, i had to move the base Debug PropertyGroup to the top before all my custom configurations and that worked. – Outgrowth 30/6, 2022 at 14:37

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When I added new solution configuration in my solution, I got an error, "The OutputPath property is not set for project X. Please check to make sure that you have specified a valid combination of Configuration and Platform for this project. Configuration='QA' Platform='AnyCPU'. This error may also appear if some other project is trying to follow a project-to-project reference to this project, this project has been unloaded or is not included in the solution, and the referencing project does not build using the same or an equivalent Configuration or Platform. ProjectY".

In my case issue was due to highlighted part of the error description. Project X part of my solution was having a project reference to ProjectY of another solution(different branch).

I've resolved this issue by modifying project X to use project reference to ProjectY in the current solution. Hope this helps someone having similar issue.

Shenyang answered 16/11, 2017 at 13:23 Comment(0)

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In my case the new "PropertyGroup" XML block was generated at the bottom of document. I've just replaced it after other "PropertyGroup" tags and this resolved the problem.

Ormandy answered 16/5, 2012 at 11:7 Comment(0)

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I created a new project in a new solution which references to existing projects. This error occurs when I add an existing project (say project 1) and try to build without adding other projects that project 1 references to.

Just make sure all the relating projects are added to the new solution and the error disappears.

Lonne answered 1/4, 2013 at 20:49 Comment(0)

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I had the same error, so I looked on project settings and there in "Build" section is "Build output path" option. And value was empty. So I filled in "bin\" value a error disappeared. It solved my problem.

Wimmer answered 3/10, 2013 at 9:45 Comment(0)

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If you decide to set OutputPath as a param, and your path is like: bin\Release\\ then remember to add \ at the end like that: /p:OutputPath=bin\Release\\\\ it took me a while to realize it was the case

Specious answered 4/2, 2016 at 1:17 Comment(0)

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I had the same problem. I fixed it by clean and rebuilt the projects.

Telophase answered 12/2, 2016 at 18:53 Comment(0)

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I had the same problem, and the only solution that helps was to set the Build Configuration Manually in each NCrunch Project.

Open the NCrunch Window, where you can see the Status of each Build and where you can see that the build failes. Right click on the project that fails to build and click on "configure selected component" there you see under "Build Settings" the property "Use build confoguration" set it to e.g. "Debug" and the property "Use build platform" set it to e.g. "AnyCPU". (Please note that the build and configuration settings you set must exist in your konfigration Settings)

Do this for all of your projects, but not for your test project. After this everything works fine for me.

Molality answered 16/2, 2016 at 7:45 Comment(0)

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I had the same problem, I fixed it by adding missing Configurations to the project that was failing.

BUILD -> Configuration Manager ->

Under Configuration Column Add

Note: This only happened to be because I have custom configuration and newly created projects didn't have the configuration.

Lapoint answered 15/4, 2016 at 14:54 Comment(0)

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In my case, I tried to move the property group that contained my custom configuration down below the standard ones. It solved it for me.

Aun answered 15/8, 2017 at 5:28 Comment(0)

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Just had this with VS2015 Professional:

The OutputPath property is not set for project 'xxxxx.csproj'. Please check to make sure that you have specified a valid combination of Configuration and Platform for this project.

This is also multi-project juggling between debug/release and different targets. I had been fiddling with build configurations at some point and I know that can mess up VS, so I pulled them back from the repo. Still no good. OutputPath was set, there were no longer any diffs with a known good state so there was definitely something wrong with my local installation.

Opened up VS2015 installer and clicked "Repair", and voila... back to normal (so far at least!)

Morbific answered 12/4, 2019 at 6:3 Comment(0)

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For me it was a line in the NuGet package configuration. Get rid of everything package related in your project file and see come back to life (save the edits). Than build it up again part by part. I brought it down to this line which I had to remove:

<Import Project="$(MSBuildToolsPath)\Microsoft.CSharp.targets" />

I got the problem after an update of NuGet packages (mainly FxCop analyzer stuff).

Daberath answered 21/10, 2020 at 8:5 Comment(0)

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For me it was my .csproj file having multiple groups

<PropertyGroup Condition=" '$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Debug|AnyCPU' ">

where

<OutputPath></OutputPath>

was empty.

Filled with bin\debug and the error went away.

Font answered 29/11, 2021 at 20:55 Comment(0)

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