Visual Studio: How to "Copy to Output Directory" without copying the folder structure?

instead of <Content> use <ContentWithTargetPath> and specify target path, like this:

<ItemGroup>
  <ContentWithTargetPath Include="lib\some_file.dat">
    <CopyToOutputDirectory>PreserveNewest</CopyToOutputDirectory>
    <TargetPath>some_file.dat</TargetPath>
  </ContentWithTargetPath>
  <None Include="lib\some_file.dat" />
</ItemGroup>

Note that this entry may not be visible from Visual Studio (2012, 2015, 2017), but once manually added to the csproj, it will appear in Visual Studio. The target path will not be editable through the UI though.

Adding a <None> entry for the file will ensure that it still shows up in Visual Studio's UI.

Keep them in $(ProjectDir)\Lib, but add those files "As a link" to the root of your .csproj. Now they will get copied to bin\Debug (or whatever other output folder) without being in lib.

EDIT: This answer was written way back when ContentWithTargetPath was not available in the versions of VS/MSBuild I was using. Leaving this answer here for people who might have to use an older version of VS. Please stop commenting on this, we all know there are better ways now.

If your main intent is to include DLLs without cluttering up the project root directory, another solution is to move the DLLs to a separate Shared Project and add this as a reference in the original project.

(Note that this post doesn't directly answer this question as it doesn't preserve the folder and project structure, but I found this approach useful because I was able to restructure my project in my case and because I wanted to avoid some of the downsides of the other approaches here.)

Steps

Right-click your Solution -> Add -> New Project -> Shared Project

Add the DLLs to this project (in the root directory of this project, not in a "lib" sub-folder)

(Check DLL file properties are set correctly, e.g. Build Action: Content and Copy to Output Directory: Copy Always)

Right-click the original project's References -> Add Reference -> Shared Projects

Select the shared project you created earlier

The setup looks like this:

https://i.stack.imgur.com/0ot1W.png

Add the dll-files as a reference to the project, and on the reference set "Copy local" to true.

If you need to copy files from the Libs directory to the root folder VS2017:

<ItemGroup Condition="'$(Platform)' == 'x64'">
    <None Include="Libs\x64\**" Link="\%(Filename)%(Extension)" CopyToOutputDirectory="PreserveNewest" />
</ItemGroup>
<ItemGroup Condition="'$(Platform)' == 'x86'">
    <None Include="Libs\x86\**" Link="\%(Filename)%(Extension)" CopyToOutputDirectory="PreserveNewest" />
</ItemGroup>

To any other folder, including Libs(RecursiveDir) folder

<ItemGroup Condition="'$(Platform)' == 'x86'">
    <None Include="Libs\x86\**" Link="mycustomfolder\%(RecursiveDir)%(Filename)%(Extension)" CopyToOutputDirectory="PreserveNewest" />
</ItemGroup>

To add my hat into the ring here, if you want to include a whole directory of content and you don't want to track each individual file in Visual Studio, then you can add this in your project file (for me this is a .vcxproj file of a UWP C++ project):

<ItemGroup>
    <Content Include="Content\**">
        <CopyToOutputDirectory>PreserveNewest</CopyToOutputDirectory>
    </Content>
</ItemGroup>

Note that the Content directory must be in the same directory as the project file in order to preserve the directory structure.

It seems in VisualStudio 2015 that if the dlls you are 'adding with a link' are in a subfolder of that same project - they will be automatically put a folder, and the output is also placed in a folder like you saw.

If the dlls are in another project or directory on disk not in a subfolder of the project, you can 'Add with a link', and they will be put in the root directory just fine.

The above solutions did not work reliably for me in Visual Studio 2019 Professional v16.8.2. Sometimes the files would copy, sometimes not. After many attempts, it feels like something may have been broken in the latest updates to VS.

This answer shows how to use a post-build script...something the OP asks not to do! So this answer is intended only for those (who like me) were unable to get more traditional methods to work.

Right-click the project and select Add > Existing Item...

Navigate to the lib folder and select the item(s) to add

To the right of Add, click the down arrow and choose Add As Link

Right-click each file in the new "lib" folder in your project, and set "Copy to Output Directory" to "Do not copy"

Open project properties Build Events and add the following Post-build event

,

rem Copy 3rd party DLL(s) to the output directory on successful build
COPY $(ProjectDir)lib\Something.dll $(TargetDir)
COPY $(ProjectDir)lib\SomethingElse.dll $(TargetDir)

Note that you can use wildcards in the post-build event to copy multiple files.

Regarding your question, the following steps worked for me in Visual Studio 2019:

In the Visual Studio editor, for your dll, set the "Build Action" setting as "Content" (This might be optional) and "Copy to Output Directory" setting as "Do not copy".

The following will then be generated within the project csproj file:

<ItemGroup>
  <Content Include="lib\IncludedDLL.dll" />
</ItemGroup>

Modify the entry to the following instead:

<ItemGroup>
  <Content Include="lib\IncludedDLL.dll" />
  <Content Include="lib\IncludedDLL.dll">
    <Link>IncludedDLL.dll</Link>
    <CopyToOutputDirectory>Always</CopyToOutputDirectory>
  </Content>
</ItemGroup>

You can set "CopyToOutputDirectory" option within the project csproj file manually to either "Always" or "PreserveNewest".

In the Visual Studio editor, it will still show the file "Copy to Output Directory" setting as "Do not copy", but the file will be copied to the root output directory upon rebuild.

The above change is not needed if you do not want to copy the file to the root output directory, so if that is the case, you can just manually remove the above change within the project csproj file to revert to the non copying behavior.

An alternate method is just to leave the items as type None. In the solution explorer, click on the ones you want to deploy and set the Content property to True.

Note: I did this in VS2019, and things can change from version to version.

To get this to work, now right-click on your project, and select "Unload Project". Then right-click on the unloaded project and select "Edit project_name.vcxproj".

In the editor, go all the way to the bottom of the file and insert this target right right before the trailing </Project> tag:

  <Target Name="CopyContent" AfterTargets="Build">
    <Copy SourceFiles="@(None)" Condition="'%(None.DeploymentContent)' == 'true'" DestinationFolder="$(OutputPath)" ContinueOnError="true" />
  </Target>

Now right click on the unloaded project and select "Reload Project". Select to save and close if you are prompted.

I also set the OutputDirectory to:

$(SolutionDir)bin\$(Configuration)\$(Platform)\

and the IntermediateDirectory to:

$(SolutionDir)obj\$(Configuration)\$(ProjectName)\$(Platform)\

in the Project Properties General page. This puts the output in a "bin" folder, and the intermediates in an "obj" folder in the root of your solution.

Note: The $(SolutionDir) is not defined when you run MSBuild from the command line. There is a trick you can use to define that to the folder where the .sln file lives using GetDirectoryNameOfFileAbove. (left as an exercise for the reader). Also, it looks like in 2019 they are handling this correctly on the command line anyway. Yeah :) The $(SolutionDir) contains a trailing backslash, hence none after it. The results of each must have a trailing backslash.

Now, if you own Pro or above, please don't do this every time you need to create a project. That would be lame. Instead, once you have your project setup just the way you like it, select Project -> Export Template. You give it a name, and the next time you want to create a project just like that one, just choose that name in the New Project dialog. (In older version, I think this was Files -> Export Teamplate....)

I had the same problem with Visual Studio 2010 / C# Project.

For assemblies (i. e. having the .NET interface) use folder "References" under your project in the Solution Explorer. Right click it, choose "Add existing item" and locate your .dll assembly.

Common .dll files can be placed in a subfolder (as "\lib" was mentioned above) and in the properties select:

Build Action = "HelpFiles"

Copy To OutputDirectory = "If Newer"

This worked for me exactly as desired - during build, the .DLLs are copied to the output directory without the "\lib" subfolder.