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Project Guidelines

Filesystem Organization

There are two types of projects: projects that provide code and projects that test code. All projects that provide code should go into the src directory and all projects that test code should go into the tests directory.

We use Directory.Build.props files in both the top level directory and the src and tests subdirectories to provide common configurations for all projects in those directories. Having subdirectories in src and tests that aren't project directories can sometimes mess with that setup and introduces unnecessary differences between project files when importing properties from files like NuGet.Build.props.

  • ❌ src/Cool Stuff/NexusMods.Foo/NexusMods.Foo.csproj
  • ✅ src/NexusMods.Foo/NexusMods.Foo.csproj

Solutions allow you to create "Solution Folders" which are virtual directories that you can use to group projects together. Use those virtual directories instead of filesystem directories for grouping projects.

Naming

Namespace

The namespace should be the same as the project name:

  • ❌ src/NexusMods.Foo/NexusMods.Foo.csproj with namespace NexusMods.Bar
  • ✅ src/NexusMods.Foo/NexusMods.Foo.csproj with namespace NexusMods.Foo

Prefix

All projects should start with the same prefix NexusMods.. For consistency, any other prefixes aren't allowed:

  • ❌ NexusMods.App.Foo
  • ❌ NexusMods.App.Bar
  • ❌ NexusMods.Abstractions.Foo
  • ❌ NexusMods.Abstractions.Bar
  • ✅ NexusMods.Foo
  • ✅ NexusMods.Bar
  • ✅ NexusMods.App

Suffix

Projects can have a suffix describing the type of code that's in the project:

  • ❌ .Abstractions
  • ❌ .Core
  • ❌ .Lib
  • ❌ .Utils/.Utilities
  • ✅ .Tests: for unit test projects
  • ✅ .UI: for projects containing axaml/xaml files

Tests

Unit test projects should only test one project and can thus be named after the original project and suffixed with .Tests. Example:

  • Project providing code: NexusMods.Foo
  • Project testing the code: NexusMods.Foo.Tests