Autorest fails if ancestor has no properties (and it shouldn't)

Let’s say something like this:

    "Article": {
      "allOf": [
        {
          "$ref": "#/definitions/CreativeWork"
        }
      ],
      "type": "object"
    },
    "NewsArticle": {
      "description": "Defines a news article.",
      "allOf": [
        {
          "$ref": "#/definitions/Article"
        }
      ],
      "type": "object",
      "properties": {}
    },

Autorest fails:

AutoRest code generation utility [version: 2.0.4166]

(C) 2017 Microsoft Corporation.
https://aka.ms/autorest
Loading AutoRest extension '@microsoft.azure/autorest.python' (preview)
Loading AutoRest extension '@microsoft.azure/autorest.modeler' (2.1.22)
FATAL: The schema's 'NewsArticle' ancestors should have at lease one property
FATAL: AutoRest.Core.Logging.CodeGenerationException: The schema's 'NewsArticle' ancestors should have at lease one property
   at AutoRest.Modeler.SwaggerModeler.BuildCompositeTypes() in C:\Users\ci\AppData\Local\Temp\PUBLISHv6236\20_20171009T223650\autorest.modeler\src\SwaggerModeler.cs:line 312
   at AutoRest.Modeler.SwaggerModeler.Build(ServiceDefinition serviceDefinition) in C:\Users\ci\AppData\Local\Temp\PUBLISHv6236\20_20171009T223650\autorest.modeler\src\SwaggerModeler.cs:line 69
   at AutoRest.Modeler.Program.<ProcessInternal>d2.MoveNext() in C:\Users\ci\AppData\Local\Temp\PUBLISHv6236\20_20171009T223650\autorest.modeler\src\Program.cs:line 53
--- End of stack trace from previous location where exception was thrown ---
   at System.Runtime.ExceptionServices.ExceptionDispatchInfo.Throw()
   at System.Runtime.CompilerServices.TaskAwaiter.HandleNonSuccessAndDebuggerNotification(Task task)
   at NewPlugin.<Process>d15.MoveNext()

Discussed with @amarzavery and looked at the Swagger spec, there is nothing that prevents an ancestor to do not have properties (whether it’s a good Swagger or not is not the question here, this respects the spec).

Impact WebSearch.

FYI @stefanvalianu

[olydis]

yup that’s on my radar and if I’m not mistaken I even have a branch sitting somewhere that has a fix - the spec will be the perfect testcase 😉

[farhadnowzari]

So the AutoRest with VisualStudio AddRestApi still doesn’t work. So the workaround until microsoft uses --generate-empty-classes would be to simply add a unused property inside that class. public int? Fake { get; set; } then create the client and then remove it from your project. The reason that we could not use AutoRest cli is that on one of the development machines the installation is corrupted. So we did this and the GUI works.