How to validate RazorLight templates at build time using Razor SDK, but use RazorLight at runtime?

[2gblue]

I'm working on an ASP.NET Core Clean Architecture project that uses Azure Functions to send out emails. The email templates are stored as .cshtml files in the Services/EmailService/Templates folder. These templates use @model to bind to a DTO located in Services/EmailService/Models/DTOs.

Since RazorLight compiles the templates at runtime, missing @model or @using directives will not be caught during the build process and these errors only surface at runtime when emails are sent out.

So errors as follows aren't caught during build:

• Missing @model directive
• Missing @using for the model namespace

So far, I've modified the SDK to Razor in EmailService.csproj with the RazorCompileOnBuild, RazorCompileOnPublish and AddRazorSupportForMvc properties set to true

<Project Sdk="Microsoft.NET.Sdk.Razor">
  <PropertyGroup>
    <TargetFramework>net8.0</TargetFramework>
    <RazorCompileOnBuild>true</RazorCompileOnBuild>
    <RazorCompileOnPublish>true</RazorCompileOnPublish>
    <AddRazorSupportForMvc>true</AddRazorSupportForMvc>
  </PropertyGroup>
</Project>

Before modifying the SDK, the solution was able to be built with zero error reported even with missing @model or deliberate @Model.missingProperty usages in the .cshtml template files