Deploy assembly containing IWizard for project template with VSIX

Question

I have created an extension for VS 2010 that deploys a project template. The project template uses a custom wizard (in a specific assembly) that is called when I create a new pr

Answer 1

You don't need to get your assembly containing the IWizard implementation in the GAC. You can simply declare it in your extension.vsixmanifest file as an Assembly element in the Content section.

Unfortunately, this doesn't appear to be documented well anywhere.

The only tricky part is making sure that the AssemblyName attribute has the correct value.

Answer 2

This works for me:

[$RootKey$\BindingPaths\{XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX}]
"$PackageFolder$"=""

But assembly element doesn't work.

Answer 3

I had no luck with the Assembly element technique to work, so in case anyone else runs into the same problem, here's another solution.

Visual Studio looks for wizard DLLs using the BindingPaths registry key. If you add the folder containing your DLL in a subkey of BindingPaths, then Visual Studio will find your DLL.

To do this from a VSIX, create a .pkgdef file in your VSIX project. Set its Include in VSIX property to True, and paste the following text into it:

[$RootKey$\BindingPaths\{XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX}]
"$PackageFolder$"=""

(where the Xs represent the package GUID, though I suspect any GUID will do).