CLI files layout includes "ref" directories that aren't required and add to size on disk/installer time

[DamianEdwards]

The CLI layout on disk after installation includes numerous ref directories. None of these, as far as I can tell, are required but were included because one is produced by default in build output since .NET 5 and thus they get included in the overall CLI layout.

We should look at tweaking the build properties to remove these directories as they simply add to the install time and on disk footprint of the CLI.

C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9> Get-ChildItem -Directory -Recurse -Filter ref | Select-Object -Property FullName

FullName
--------
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\ref
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\DotnetTools\dotnet-watch\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.5\tools\net6.0\any\ref
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\Microsoft\Microsoft.NET.Build.Extensions\tools\net6.0\ref
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\Sdks\Microsoft.NET.Sdk\tools\net6.0\ref
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\Sdks\Microsoft.NET.Sdk.BlazorWebAssembly\tools\net6.0\ref
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\Sdks\Microsoft.NET.Sdk.Publish\tools\net6.0\ref
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\Sdks\Microsoft.NET.Sdk.Razor\tasks\net6.0\ref
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\Sdks\Microsoft.NET.Sdk.Web\tools\net6.0\ref
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\Sdks\Microsoft.NET.Sdk.Web.ProjectSystem\tools\net6.0\ref
C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9\Sdks\Microsoft.NET.Sdk.Worker\tools\net6.0\ref

C:\Program Files\dotnet\sdk\6.0.100-preview.3.21153.9>

Note that changing the default for exe outputs to not produce a ref dir is being considered for .NET 6 #16193

[dotnet-issue-labeler]

I couldn't figure out the best area label to add to this issue. If you have write-permissions please help me learn by adding exactly one area label.

[wli3]

That should be easy to implement. Just find all projects to set ProduceReferenceAssembly to false. Meanwhile redist project has it set already

We might want to do #16193 instead

[marcpopMSFT]

For 6.0.100, we should not include these in the sdk install. Separately, we should discuss not including them in the bin directory output at all on a build and the repercussions of that change.

[marcpopMSFT]

Adding this to the SDK product size .net 7 idea document and closing.