2020-09-12.md

Date: September 12 2020
Original Post: https://www.reddit.com/r/dotnet/comments/irancy/standard_targetframework_documentation_dynamic/

.NET Target Framework Badge

You can use shields.io io to create dynamic badges to document what the TargetFramework is of your .NET project. shields.io supports dynamic query badges in XML format, and your .csproj, .fsproj, or .vbproj files are XML files. Here is an example badge from my Towel project:

<a href="https://dotnet.microsoft.com/download" alt=".NET target"><img alt=".NET target" src="https://img.shields.io/badge/dynamic/xml?color=%23512bd4&label=target&query=%2F%2FTargetFramework%5B1%5D&url=https%3A%2F%2Fraw.githubusercontent.com%2FZacharyPatten%2FTowel%2Fmain%2FSources%2FTowel%2FTowel.csproj&logo=.net" title="Go To .NET Download"></a>

How can you make your own badge? Go to shields.io and scroll down to the "dynamic" section, and input the parameters for your project:

• data type: xml
• label: target
• data url: This will be the raw content of your project file. If using GitHub, go to your .csproj, .fsproj, or .vbproj file and click the Raw button. Then use that URL for this parameter. For Towel, I used: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ZacharyPatten/Towel/main/Sources/Towel/Towel.csproj].
• query: //TargetFramework[1] This is just an XPATH. You may need to make adjustments if you have multiple targets.
• color: #512bd4

Then just click Make Badge and shields.io will redirect you to your badge. Just copy the URL that you are redirected to, and use it inside an image markdown or HTML like so:

<a href="https://dotnet.microsoft.com/download" alt=".NET target"><img alt=".NET target" src="YOUR-BADGE-URL" title="Go To .NET Download"></a>

^{Where "YOUR-BADGE-URL" is the URL of your badge.}

If you want to add the .NET logo to the badge, you can append this on the end of the URL of your badge: &logo=.net.

Since this is a dynamic queried badge, if you change the target framework on your project, this badge will automatically update with it.

It would be nice if everyone in the .NET community started using standard target framework badges at the top of their README files. :)