Razor-based view doesn't see referenced assemblies

There is a new configuration section that is used to reference namespaces for Razor views.

Open the web.config file in your Views folder, and make sure it has the following:

<configuration>
    <configSections>
        <sectionGroup name="system.web.webPages.razor" type="System.Web.WebPages.Razor.Configuration.RazorWebSectionGroup, System.Web.WebPages.Razor, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35">
            <section name="host" type="System.Web.WebPages.Razor.Configuration.HostSection, System.Web.WebPages.Razor, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" requirePermission="false" />
            <section name="pages" type="System.Web.WebPages.Razor.Configuration.RazorPagesSection, System.Web.WebPages.Razor, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" requirePermission="false" />
        </sectionGroup>
    </configSections>

    <system.web.webPages.razor>
        <host factoryType="System.Web.Mvc.MvcWebRazorHostFactory, System.Web.Mvc, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" />
        <pages pageBaseType="System.Web.Mvc.WebViewPage">
            <namespaces>
                <add namespace="System.Web.Mvc" />
                <add namespace="System.Web.Mvc.Ajax" />
                <add namespace="System.Web.Mvc.Html" />
                <add namespace="System.Web.Routing" />
                <add namespace="SquishIt.Framework" />
                <add namespace="Your.Namespace.Etc" />
            </namespaces>
        </pages>
    </system.web.webPages.razor>
</configuration>

Alternatively, you can add using statements to your shared layout:

@using Your.Namespace.Etc;
<!DOCTYPE html>
<head>
....

After editing the Web.config, restart Visual Studio to apply the changes.


I had the same problem: MVC3 Project MyCore.Web was referencing to MyCore.DBLayer namespace from another project in the same solution (with assembly name MyCoreDBLayer). All objects from MyCore.DBLayer worked perfectly in Controllers and Models but failed in Razor views with an error 'The type or namespace name 'DBLayer' does not exist in the namespace 'MyCore' (are you missing an assembly reference?)' which was obviously not the case.

  • Copy Local option was set to true.
  • Adding "using..." statements in Razor views was useless
  • Adding namespaces to system.web.webPages.razor section was useless as well

Adding assembly referecene to system.web/compilation/assemblies section of the root web.config file fixed the issue. The section now looks like:

<system.web>
    <compilation debug="true" targetFramework="4.0">
      <assemblies>
        <add assembly="System.Web.Abstractions, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" />
        <add assembly="System.Web.Helpers, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" />
        <add assembly="System.Web.Routing, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" />
        <add assembly="System.Web.Mvc, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" />
        <add assembly="System.Web.WebPages, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" />
        **<add assembly="MyCoreDBLayer" />**
      </assemblies>
    </compilation>
...
</system.web>

Omitting version, culture, token was OK for now, but should be fixed in the future.


In my case, the separate project that contained the namespace was a Console Application. Changing it to a Class Library fixed the problem.

Tags:

Asp.Net Mvc

Razor

Asp.Net Mvc 3

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