Fizzler | .NET CSS Selector Engine

When adding a Dataset to an .rdlc report using the Report Designer, Visual Studio crashes. VS leaves a failure.txt file with this error:

System.IO.FileNotFoundException: Could not load file or assembly Microsoft.Extensions.DependencyInjection.Abstractions, Version=3.1.0.0

The problem appeared when we upgraded the Intuit QuickBooks Online NuGet package (IppDotNetSdkForQuickBooksApiV3) from v8 to v14. This upgrade brought in a dozen or so other dependent packages, including the package causing the FileNotFoundException above.

We cannot add a dataset to a report nor get the properties of a dataset that’s already in the report. Obviously, this is a real show-stopper for developing reports. Does anyone have suggestions?

More Background:

This is a large web forms application that’s been in production for years. We’re using the latest version of Visual Studio, Community 2019 Version 16.6.3. We’re running under Windows 10 Pro with all updates. We see the same issue with two different developers on different PCs.

VS has the latest version of the RDLC Report Designer extension, v15.3.1. Our application is targeting .Net 4.7.2.

NuGet package “Microsoft.ReportingServices.ReportViewerControl.WebForms 150.1404.0” is installed.

NuGet package “Microsoft.Extensions.DependencyInjection.Abstractions v3.1.5” is installed. Note that the error complains about v3.1.1.0, and earlier version. I have a binding redirect in the web.config file to handle this (bindingRedirect oldVersion="0.0.0.0-3.1.5.0" newVersion="3.1.5.0").

There are about 70 other packages in this solution, and all are up to date.

Things I’ve Tried:

I’ve spent several days on this problem so far. There are several SO posts that list a similar error, but they don’t appear to apply in my case.

I’ve removed all NuGet packages, the solution’s “packages” folder, and any references in the config and csproj files. I’ve reset Windows and installed VS from scratch. I added back in only the NuGet packages that were required. No help.

If I delete the project’s bin and obj folders, relaunch VS, and rebuild the solution, VS doesn’t crash - yay! But updating a dataset doesn’t show the changes in the dataset’s fields, so it really doesn’t help. Also, if you exit and relaunch VS, the crashes are back.

I tried downgrading the offending package from v3.1.5 to the desired 3.1.0. My idea was that if a binding redirect isn’t needed, there’s no longer a problem. But when I tried this, other packages faulted with the same error, and on and on. I gave up, as there are just too many packages tied to Intuit’s IppDotNetSdkForQuickBooksApiV3.

I tried creating a new project with just an empty report and not much else. I added the Intuit package and all of its dependencies (including the offending one). Surprisingly, everything worked normally and I could add and edit datasets in the report. This makes me suspect there may be conflicts between packages, or some problem deeper in our solution. No clue as to what it might be, though.

I turned on FusionLog and reproduced the problem. I’ve attached the output of the failure.txt file.

===== Fusion Log =====