MSBuild Conditions

Article
11/15/2016

Note

This article applies to Visual Studio 2015. If you're looking for the latest Visual Studio documentation, see Visual Studio documentation. We recommend upgrading to the latest version of Visual Studio. Download it here

MSBuild supports a specific set of conditions that can be applied wherever a Condition attribute is allowed. The following table explains those conditions.

Condition	Description
'`stringA`' == '`stringB`'	Evaluates to `true` if `stringA` equals `stringB`. For example: `Condition="'$(CONFIG)'=='DEBUG'"` Single quotes are not required for simple alphanumeric strings or boolean values. However, single quotes are required for empty values.
'`stringA`' != '`stringB`'	Evaluates to `true` if `stringA` is not equal to `stringB`. For example: `Condition="'$(CONFIG)'!='DEBUG'"` Single quotes are not required for simple alphanumeric strings or boolean values. However, single quotes are required for empty values.
<, >, <=, >=	Evaluates the numeric values of the operands. Returns `true` if the relational evaluation is true. Operands must evaluate to a decimal or hexadecimal number. Hexadecimal numbers must begin with "0x". Note: In XML, the characters `<` and `>` must be escaped. The symbol `<` is represented as `<`. The symbol `>` is represented as `>`.
Exists('`stringA`')	Evaluates to `true` if a file or folder with the name `stringA` exists. For example: `Condition="!Exists('$(builtdir)')"` Single quotes are not required for simple alphanumeric strings or boolean values. However, single quotes are required for empty values.
HasTrailingSlash('`stringA`')	Evaluates to `true` if the specified string contains either a trailing backward slash (\) or forward slash (/) character. For example: `Condition="!HasTrailingSlash('$(OutputPath)')"` Single quotes are not required for simple alphanumeric strings or boolean values. However, single quotes are required for empty values.
!	Evaluates to `true` if the operand evaluates to `false`.
And	Evaluates to `true` if both operands evaluate to `true`.
Or	Evaluates to `true` if at least one of the operands evaluates to `true`.
()	Grouping mechanism that evaluates to `true` if expressions contained inside evaluate to `true`.
$if$ ( %expression% ), $else$, $endif$	Checks whether the specified `%expression%` matches the string value of the passed custom template parameter. If the $if$ condition evaluates to `true`, then its statements are run; otherwise, the $else$ condition is checked. If the $else$ condition is `true`, then its statements are run; otherwise, the $endif$ condition ends expression evaluation. For examples of usage, see Visual Studio Project/Item Template Parameter Logic.

Share via

MSBuild Conditions

See Also

Additional resources