Configure Visual Studio 2013 to allow ASPNETCOMPILER to precompile using the x64 compiler

Question

How can I use the \"Precompile during publishing\" flag on a VS2013 x64 project? No matter what I do, it fails to publish because it insists on using the x86 ASPNETCOMPILER.

Answer 1

This seems to be a bug in Visual Studio 2013.

Microsoft Connect - Precompile error when using X64 platform

The workaround listed there works and is to add the following xml in the Project/PropertyGroup xml tag to the publish profile (located in the Properties\PublishProfiles directory of your project).

<AspnetCompilerPath>C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319</AspnetCompilerPath>

I was getting this build error before applying the above workaround: "Could not load file or assembly '****' or one of its dependencies. An attempt was made to load a program with an incorrect format." - ASPNETCOMPILER

Answer 2

Still an issue in Visual Studio 2015 Update 3...

Fix: Open the csproj file of the project in your favourite text editor.

Locate:

<MvcBuildViews>true</MvcBuildViews>

Add the following below it:

<AspNetToolPath Condition=" '$(Platform)' == 'x64'">$(windir)\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319</AspNetToolPath>

Locate:

<Target Name="MvcBuildViews" AfterTargets="AfterBuild" Condition="'$(MvcBuildViews)'=='true'" >
  <AspNetCompiler VirtualPath="temp" PhysicalPath="$(WebProjectOutputDir)" />
</Target>

Amend the AspNetCompiler line as follows:

<AspNetCompiler VirtualPath="temp" PhysicalPath="$(WebProjectOutputDir)" ToolPath="$(AspNetToolPath)" />