Require dll using string path in F#

Question

Is there a way to do this in F#:

let fakeToolsPath = "D:\tools\FAKE\tools\FakeLib.dll"

#r fakeToolsPath

the fake tools are on a different path depending on the build agent that builds the code, so I need to be able to set it dynamically, from an environment variable or some config file.

Answer 1

Three ideas, in order of increasing hackiness - you'll be the judge which one makes most sense in your scenario:

1. In .fsx script, you can use __SOURCE_DIRECTORY__ to get the directory where the script is located. If your dll is always located in the same directory relative to the script, you can use that as a "hook" to get to it.
2. There's a command-line --reference argument to fsi.exe that should do what you want. If you're using fake.exe instead, you can use --fsiargs to pass it in (take a look at the link for details).
3. If everything else fails, create a symlink as a separate build step in your CI job configuration and just hardcode the path in the script.