[Bug]: Inconsistent behavior when using Choose element for conditional package references in MSBuild about msbuild HOT 2 OPEN

What's happening here is that the Choose condition evaluation happens only in the properties evaluation pass (pass 1), at which time the condition isn't true--Directory.Build.props is imported before the body of the project, so IsTestProject hasn't been set yet when the condition evaluates.

ItemGroup evaluation happens later (in pass 3), after all properties (from all imports) have been set, so your step-6 condition evaluates to the value you expect.

I was a bit surprised by this Choose condition timing, and it doesn't seem to be well documented outside this comment which doesn't help anyone:

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Hi @rainersigwald,
If I understand correctly, the observed behaviour is by design. Which would be quite logical if project related files are interpreted in multiple passes and the Choose block is only evaluated once. The current behaviour is therefore quite obscure, and I would rather avoid its usage altogether.
Would it be an option to modify the behaviour of the Choose block so it is evaluated in each pass?

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