Open-XML-SDK.sln fails to build with dotnet after adding .NET 3.5 support

Warning: Newbie Observation I just want to use the PowerShell part of Open-XML-PowerTools. I am 5 hours into trying to get this code to build on a fresh install of VS Code and .Net Core. The brief build instructions are not enough to do the job. I’d be happy to write them up, but that would require success. If someone can assist me in getting the code to compile I’ll repay the favor by writing it all into an updated “how to” for this project.

Right now I am stuck with:

dotnet restore .\Open-XML-SDK.sln
dotnet build .\Open-XML-SDK.sln /p:Configuration=Debug

I get the error: (I have tried to use TargetFramework=net46 but that fails with the same error.)

C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\1.0.3\Microsoft.Common.CurrentVersion.targets(1111,5): error MSB3644: The reference assemblies for framework “.NETFramework,Version=v3.5” were not found. To resolve this, install the SDK or Targeting Pack for this framework version or retarget your application to a version of the framework for which you have the SDK or Targeting Pack installed. Note that assemblies will be resolved from the Global Assembly Cache (GAC) and will be used in place of reference assemblies. Therefore your assembly may not be correctly targeted for the framework you intend. [D:.…\WindowsPowerShell\Modules\Open-XML-SDK\DocumentFormat.OpenXml\DocumentFormat.OpenXml.csproj]

[MatthewMcD]

Taylor, I really appreciate the assistance. But still fail to see how to connect the dots. I just reviewed the video on Open XML Tools for “Gitting, Building, and Installing Open-Xml-PowerTools” and found my comment from 3 months ago asking why it does not build in VS2013+Update 4 as he said it would.

“If all you want to do is run in PowerShell you need to do the following.” None of this is intuitive and assumes that Git, Slurp, Burp and dotnet, msbuild are all part of the readers every day life. So much of the “documentation” has comments like:

“The following instructions are somewhat outdated at this point.”

followed by three paragraphs of installation instructions that do not work.

I am just offering to document it so it will actually build for a technical ITPro. After all, I use PowerShell and this is a PowerShell extension that appears to offer features to save me time…so far it is neither.

I don’t meant to sound at all ungrateful! I really appreciate this type of community project. I’d just like to help the next person who stumbles in here with zero project history expecting to get the bits working.

[MatthewMcD]

Back at it…built a clean environment. Installed VS2017 Community. Cloned both projects into PowerShell\Modules. Built the SDK without error.

Nothing is working, but it does build. https://github.com/OfficeDev/Open-Xml-PowerTools/issues/143