No executable found for library with references

Steps to reproduce

1. Given the environment like below, create a solution HelloWorld
2. Add a library project HelloWorld.Avalonia with some views to test the designer
3. Add an executable project HelloWorld.Desktop which references HelloWorld.Avalonia
4. Build the entire solution
5. Open a view of HelloWorld.Avalonia in the designer

Expected behavior

After selecting HelloWorld.Desktop as executable project the designer should work.

Actual behavior

The designer does not load and logs an error:
[Error] No executable found.

Tested versions (all affected)

• .NET Core 3.1 and .NET 5.0
• Avalonia 0.9.12 and 0.10.0-rc1

Environment

• Windows 10 Pro (19042.685)
• Visual Studio 2019 Community (16.8.3)
• Avalonia for Visual Studio 0.9.12.0

Workaround

Add a package reference to Avalonia to all your executable projects. The designer doesn’t find transient references.

[glen-nicol]

This recently started happening to me after updating Visual Studio 22 to 17.7.0.

[Flithor]

@maxkatz6 I had a similar problem on my project. That the designer was forced my Avalonia control class library to use one (D) of 4 executable program projects (A,B,C,D) in solution, and because of this project D due to some thing wrong when my colleague check-in, the csproj file have not checked-in, so I could not be compiled the project D. Then, so my library got the same behavior because it was forced to use the project D. After my colleague checked-in the csproj file of project D, project D can be compiled, and this problem disappears. But it’s strange, there are 4 executable program projects in my solution, why the designer force the class library to use that project D which can’t be compiled?