Allow to use global packages folder by drognanar · Pull Request #15483 · microsoft/vstest

drognanar · 2026-03-12T13:42:50Z

nohwnd · 2026-03-12T13:46:41Z

test/Microsoft.TestPlatform.TestUtilities/IntegrationTestEnvironment.cs

+    /// Gets the local NuGet cache directory used by test assets.
+    /// Test assets are restored into this directory by Build.cs via <c>dotnet restore --packages</c>.
+    /// </summary>
+    public static string TestAssetsNuGetCacheDirectory { get; } = Path.Combine(RepoRootDirectory, ".packages");


Suggested change

public static string TestAssetsNuGetCacheDirectory { get; } = Path.Combine(RepoRootDirectory, ".packages");

public static string TestAssetsNuGetCacheDirectory { get; } = Path.Combine(RepoRootDirectory, "artifacts", ".packages");

I'd move it here to make it less confusing. Tests are responsible for managing that folder.

this should now be moved

Copilot

Pull request overview

Updates integration/acceptance test infrastructure to use a consistent, repo-local NuGet packages cache (.packages) without relying on pipeline-level NUGET_PACKAGES overrides, addressing #15469.

Changes:

Introduces a shared TestAssetsNuGetCacheDirectory and updates test code to use it instead of hardcoding .packages paths.
Forces restore for the acceptance integration tests project into the repo-local .packages folder and updates package content paths accordingly.
Removes NUGET_PACKAGES overrides from Azure Pipelines and adjusts NuGet.config/test config rewriting behavior.

Reviewed changes

Copilot reviewed 8 out of 8 changed files in this pull request and generated 4 comments.

Show a summary per file

File	Description
test/Microsoft.TestPlatform.TestUtilities/IntegrationTestEnvironment.cs	Adds a central `.packages` path constant and uses it for test package resolution.
test/Microsoft.TestPlatform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests/Microsoft.TestPlatform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests.csproj	Sets restore/package content paths to use repo-local `.packages`.
test/Microsoft.TestPlatform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests/Extension/CompatibilityRowsBuilder.cs	Switches hardcoded `.packages` path usage to the shared constant.
test/Microsoft.TestPlatform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests/Build.cs	Uses the shared `.packages` path for test package operations.
test/Microsoft.TestPlatform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests/AcceptanceTestBase.cs	Changes NuGet.config rewriting to inject `globalPackagesFolder` pointing to the shared `.packages` path.
azure-pipelines.yml	Removes pipeline-level `NUGET_PACKAGES` override.
azure-pipelines-official.yml	Removes pipeline-level `NUGET_PACKAGES` override.
NuGet.config	Removes default `globalPackagesFolder` entry and updates comments to reflect new injection approach.

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Copilot · 2026-03-12T13:48:28Z

...atform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests/Microsoft.TestPlatform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests.csproj

+    <!-- Restore packages to the local .packages directory so integration tests can find them at a known path. -->
+    <RestorePackagesPath>$(RepoRoot).packages\</RestorePackagesPath>


$(RepoRoot).packages\... concatenates without a path separator between $(RepoRoot) and .packages, and it hardcodes backslashes (which can be treated as a literal character on non-Windows). This can produce an invalid restore/content path (e.g., C:\repo.packages\... or a path containing \ on Linux), breaking restore and file inclusion. Prefer building the path with an explicit separator (e.g., $(RepoRoot)\.packages\...) or via an MSBuild property using System.IO.Path::Combine and then reuse that property for both RestorePackagesPath and Content Include.

Copilot · 2026-03-12T13:48:28Z

...atform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests/Microsoft.TestPlatform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests.csproj

    -->
    <PackageReference Include="Microsoft.Internal.Dia" Version="$(TestPlatformMSDiaVersion)" PrivateAssets="all" />
-    <Content Include="..\..\.packages\microsoft.internal.dia\$(TestPlatformMSDiaVersion)\tools\net451\**\*">
+    <Content Include="$(RepoRoot).packages\microsoft.internal.dia\$(TestPlatformMSDiaVersion)\tools\net451\**\*">


$(RepoRoot).packages\... concatenates without a path separator between $(RepoRoot) and .packages, and it hardcodes backslashes (which can be treated as a literal character on non-Windows). This can produce an invalid restore/content path (e.g., C:\repo.packages\... or a path containing \ on Linux), breaking restore and file inclusion. Prefer building the path with an explicit separator (e.g., $(RepoRoot)\.packages\...) or via an MSBuild property using System.IO.Path::Combine and then reuse that property for both RestorePackagesPath and Content Include.

Copilot · 2026-03-12T13:48:29Z

test/Microsoft.TestPlatform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests/AcceptanceTestBase.cs

+                    // Point packages folder to vstest's local .packages cache used by test assets.
+                    .Replace("</config>", $"""<add key="globalPackagesFolder" value="{IntegrationTestEnvironment.TestAssetsNuGetCacheDirectory}" /></config>""")


This injects XML via a string replace on </config>, which is fragile if the copied NuGet.config formatting changes (e.g., whitespace variations, self-closing tags, or additional </config> occurrences from future edits). A more robust approach is to load the file as XML (e.g., XDocument), locate/create the <config> element, and add the <add key="globalPackagesFolder" ... /> node before saving.

test/Microsoft.TestPlatform.TestUtilities/IntegrationTestEnvironment.cs

nohwnd · 2026-03-12T13:50:04Z

...atform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests/Microsoft.TestPlatform.Acceptance.IntegrationTests.csproj

    <OutputType>Exe</OutputType>
    <TargetFrameworks>net9.0;net48</TargetFrameworks>
+    <!-- Restore packages to the local .packages directory so integration tests can find them at a known path. -->
+    <RestorePackagesPath>$(RepoRoot).packages\</RestorePackagesPath>


Is this only for the msdia dependency below?

pretty much. also reading through how integration tests work.

so far my understanding is that with the global cache:

the Build.cs will handle preparing the artifacts/.packages folder for all acceptance tests. there's a method that will remove all -dev packages before the test runs

test assets such as CLIProject, MSTestV1UnitTestProject, LegacySettingsUnitTestProject are all using the local .packages cacheDid

it would seem that we can fully make this use the global cache. running all tests to validate that this works

Yeah I think the only "problem" here is figuring out where the global cache is, but maybe we could get rid of all the dependencies on that package instead. I am not if the tests are testing something that an integration test does not test.

- Remove globalPackagesFolder from NuGet.config so the main solution build uses the default global NuGet cache (~/.nuget/packages/). - Remove NUGET_PACKAGES overrides from CI pipelines. - Move test asset NuGet cache from .packages/ to artifacts/.packages/ so it lives under the already-gitignored artifacts/ directory. - Test assets (built by Build.cs) continue to restore into the local cache via explicit --packages flag. - Update AcceptanceTestBase to inject globalPackagesFolder into copied NuGet.config for isolated test asset builds. - Fix msdia Content Include to use $(NuGetPackageRoot) since it is restored by the solution build, not by Build.cs test asset restoration. Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

nohwnd · 2026-03-13T07:06:38Z

Will merge after #15484 , I touched the same files

drognanar · 2026-03-13T11:09:33Z

I've applied the feedback.

We should now be using artifacts/.packages, and only use that for the integration test samples (so if integration tests are not being run things should be good).

nohwnd · 2026-03-16T15:36:20Z

There were too many conflicts, moved your code to new PR, sorry for "stealing it".

Copilot AI review requested due to automatic review settings March 12, 2026 13:42

nohwnd reviewed Mar 12, 2026

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Copilot AI reviewed Mar 12, 2026

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drognanar force-pushed the global_packages branch from 8b74ace to 46375b9 Compare March 13, 2026 11:07

nohwnd mentioned this pull request Mar 16, 2026

Use global package cache for build, and local for running integration tests #15500

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nohwnd closed this Mar 16, 2026

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Allow to use global packages folder#15483

Allow to use global packages folder#15483
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	public static string TestAssetsNuGetCacheDirectory { get; } = Path.Combine(RepoRootDirectory, ".packages");
	public static string TestAssetsNuGetCacheDirectory { get; } = Path.Combine(RepoRootDirectory, "artifacts", ".packages");

		<!-- Restore packages to the local .packages directory so integration tests can find them at a known path. -->
		<RestorePackagesPath>$(RepoRoot).packages\</RestorePackagesPath>

		// Point packages folder to vstest's local .packages cache used by test assets.
		.Replace("</config>", $"""<add key="globalPackagesFolder" value="{IntegrationTestEnvironment.TestAssetsNuGetCacheDirectory}" /></config>""")

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