Add `aspire dashboard` CLI command by JamesNK · Pull Request #15607 · microsoft/aspire

JamesNK · 2026-03-26T06:32:22Z

Description

Add a new aspire dashboard CLI command that starts a standalone Aspire Dashboard instance using the aspire-managed binary from the CLI bundle, and refactor the process execution infrastructure to support both dotnet CLI and non-dotnet processes through a single abstraction.

`aspire dashboard` command

Runs the dashboard in the foreground, blocking until Ctrl+C, with a readiness check (waits for "Now listening on:" output)
Displays a summary panel with dashboard URL, OTLP gRPC/HTTP endpoints, and log file path
Generates a browser token for frontend authentication by default (passed via environment variable to avoid exposure in process listings)
Supports typed options: --frontend-url, --otlp-grpc-url, --otlp-http-url, --allow-anonymous, --config-file-path
Forwards unmatched tokens directly to the dashboard process for pass-through configuration
Respects configuration set via environment variables or unmatched --KEY=value / --KEY value tokens, skipping defaults when already provided
Handles dashboard-specific exit codes (unexpected error, validation failure, address in use) with localized error messages
Categorized under the Monitoring help group

Unified process execution infrastructure

Renamed IDotNetCliExecutionFactory → IProcessExecutionFactory and IDotNetCliExecution → IProcessExecution to reflect that process execution is no longer dotnet-specific
Renamed DotNetCliExecution → ProcessExecution and deleted the old DotNetCliExecutionFactory
Moved dotnet-specific environment setup (orphan detection, MSBUILDTERMINALLOGGER, DOTNET_NOLOGO, private SDK resolution) from DotNetCliExecutionFactory into DotNetCliRunner, keeping IProcessExecutionFactory generic
Added Kill(bool entireProcessTree) and IDisposable to IProcessExecution so callers can manage process lifetime
Renamed DotNetCliRunnerInvocationOptions → ProcessInvocationOptions
Changed LayoutProcessRunner from a static helper using raw System.Diagnostics.Process to an instance class that delegates to IProcessExecutionFactory, making it testable via DI
ProcessExecutionFactory now accepts a fileName parameter so it can launch any executable, not just dotnet

Dashboard exit code tests

Added StartupTests.Run_AddressAlreadyInUse_ReturnsExitCodeAddressInUse and Run_ValidationFailure_ReturnsNegativeOne to verify dashboard exit code behavior

Validation

All 21 DashboardCommandTests pass, covering default args, individual options (Theory), combined options, unmatched token forwarding, browser token generation, and process error handling
All existing CLI tests pass with the renamed types

Checklist

Is this feature complete?
- Yes. Ready to ship.
- No. Follow-up changes expected.
Are you including unit tests for the changes and scenario tests if relevant?
- Yes
- No
Did you add public API?
- Yes
- No
Does the change make any security assumptions or guarantees?
- Yes
- No
Does the change require an update in our Aspire docs?
- Yes
  - Link to aspire.dev issue:
    - New issue
- No

github-actions · 2026-03-26T06:32:47Z

🚀 Dogfood this PR with:

⚠️ WARNING: Do not do this without first carefully reviewing the code of this PR to satisfy yourself it is safe.

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/microsoft/aspire/main/eng/scripts/get-aspire-cli-pr.sh | bash -s -- 15607

Or

Run remotely in PowerShell:

iex "& { $(irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/microsoft/aspire/main/eng/scripts/get-aspire-cli-pr.ps1) } 15607"

Copilot

Pull request overview

Adds a new aspire dashboard top-level CLI command to launch the standalone Aspire Dashboard via the bundled aspire-managed binary, integrating it into the root command set and localized resources.

Changes:

Registers a new DashboardCommand in the CLI host and root command, categorized under the Monitoring help group.
Implements foreground and --detach execution paths and introduces localized resource strings for the new command.
Adds initial unit tests covering --help and the “bundle not available” error case.

Reviewed changes

Copilot reviewed 19 out of 20 changed files in this pull request and generated 4 comments.

Show a summary per file

File	Description
tests/Aspire.Cli.Tests/Utils/CliTestHelper.cs	Registers `DashboardCommand` in the test DI container.
tests/Aspire.Cli.Tests/Commands/DashboardCommandTests.cs	Adds tests for help and missing-bundle error behavior.
src/Aspire.Cli/Program.cs	Registers `DashboardCommand` in the production DI container.
src/Aspire.Cli/Commands/RootCommand.cs	Adds `dashboard` as a root subcommand.
src/Aspire.Cli/Commands/DashboardCommand.cs	Implements the new `aspire dashboard` command (foreground/detach + arg pass-through).
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/DashboardCommandStrings.resx	Adds new localized strings for the dashboard command.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/DashboardCommandStrings.Designer.cs	Strongly-typed accessor for the new dashboard strings.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.cs.xlf	Localization XLF for `cs`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.de.xlf	Localization XLF for `de`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.es.xlf	Localization XLF for `es`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.fr.xlf	Localization XLF for `fr`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.it.xlf	Localization XLF for `it`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.ja.xlf	Localization XLF for `ja`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.ko.xlf	Localization XLF for `ko`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.pl.xlf	Localization XLF for `pl`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.pt-BR.xlf	Localization XLF for `pt-BR`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.ru.xlf	Localization XLF for `ru`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.tr.xlf	Localization XLF for `tr`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.zh-Hans.xlf	Localization XLF for `zh-Hans`.
src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/xlf/DashboardCommandStrings.zh-Hant.xlf	Localization XLF for `zh-Hant`.

Files not reviewed (1)

src/Aspire.Cli/Resources/DashboardCommandStrings.Designer.cs: Language not supported

MermaidIsla · 2026-03-28T15:14:04Z

Would it make sense to have an alias aspire dash ?

KalleOlaviNiemitalo · 2026-03-29T05:13:02Z

To me, aspire dash sounds too much like it would run a dash shell.

adamint

couple thoughts on the command shape:

aspire ps won't find a standalone dashboard — it discovers running AppHosts via backchannel sockets in ~/.aspire/cli/backchannels, and aspire dashboard doesn't register anything there. so once you start a dashboard you have no way to get the URL/token/status back from the CLI. do we need a different mechanism for dashboards?

feels like this should be aspire dashboard start rather than just aspire dashboard — leaves room for aspire dashboard stop/aspire dashboard status later, and matches the pattern we already have with config, secret, otel, certs, etc.

also, should this support --detach? aspire run already has it and a standalone dashboard seems like an even better candidate for running in the background. related — does the standalone dashboard need --isolated support to avoid port conflicts if someone's already running an AppHost with its own dashboard or if people want to start multiple?

JamesNK · 2026-04-01T03:24:55Z

Yes I had the same thoughts. Right now this is basically aspire run but for the dashboard. We start the dashboard, print its information out, capture its output for logs, and that's it.

If we want aspire dashboard start so it runs in the background then we would also need a way to:

Registered what running dashboards there are
Get their information (e.g. public URL)
Trigger shutdown for an instance (identify instances by the public URL?)
Dashboard commands for start/stop/ps

It becomes a lot more complicated.

@davidfowl How far do you want to go with this?

davidfowl · 2026-04-01T03:54:04Z

I think we do aspire dashboard run and leave it as a blocking command. Which also leaves it for space to grow so we don;t need to do the background work right now.

JamesNK · 2026-04-01T07:01:40Z

I think we do aspire dashboard run and leave it as a blocking command. Which also leaves it for space to grow so we don;t need to do the background work right now.

Done

github-actions · 2026-04-01T10:36:55Z

Re-running the failed jobs in the CI workflow for this pull request because 1 job was identified as retry-safe transient failures in the CI run attempt.
GitHub was asked to rerun all failed jobs for that attempt, and the rerun is being tracked in the rerun attempt.
The job links below point to the failed attempt jobs that matched the retry-safe transient failure rules.

Tests / Hosting-1 / Hosting-1 (windows-latest) - Job-level runner or infrastructure failure matched the transient allowlist.

github-actions · 2026-04-01T11:18:09Z

Re-running the failed jobs in the CI workflow for this pull request because 1 job was identified as retry-safe transient failures in the CI run attempt.
GitHub was asked to rerun all failed jobs for that attempt, and the rerun is being tracked in the rerun attempt.
The job links below point to the failed attempt jobs that matched the retry-safe transient failure rules.

Tests / Templates-NewUpAndBuildStandaloneTemplateTests / Templates-NewUpAndBuildStandaloneTemplateTests (windows-latest) - Failed step 'Set up job' matched the transient annotation allowlist.

JamesNK · 2026-04-01T14:50:25Z

E2E test added: https://asciinema.org/a/RsxumCjxMzMArNWh

davidfowl

Looks pretty good!

…tService constructor call

…rt-failure error message - Remove 'using' on execution in DotNetCliRunner.ExecuteAsync to prevent ObjectDisposedException when StartBackchannelAsync accesses the process after the method returns (fire-and-forget pattern). - Add dedicated DashboardFailedToStart resource string for process start failures instead of reusing the exit-code format string.

github-actions · 2026-04-03T23:08:26Z

🎬 CLI E2E Test Recordings — 56 recordings uploaded (commit d74fd25)

View recordings

Test	Recording
AddPackageInteractiveWhileAppHostRunningDetached	▶️ View Recording
AddPackageWhileAppHostRunningDetached	▶️ View Recording
AgentCommands_AllHelpOutputs_AreCorrect	▶️ View Recording
AgentInitCommand_DefaultSelection_InstallsSkillOnly	▶️ View Recording
AgentInitCommand_MigratesDeprecatedConfig	▶️ View Recording
AllPublishMethodsBuildDockerImages	▶️ View Recording
AspireAddPackageVersionToDirectoryPackagesProps	▶️ View Recording
AspireUpdateRemovesAppHostPackageVersionFromDirectoryPackagesProps	▶️ View Recording
Banner_DisplayedOnFirstRun	▶️ View Recording
Banner_DisplayedWithExplicitFlag	▶️ View Recording
Banner_NotDisplayedWithNoLogoFlag	▶️ View Recording
CertificatesClean_RemovesCertificates	▶️ View Recording
CertificatesTrust_WithNoCert_CreatesAndTrustsCertificate	▶️ View Recording
CertificatesTrust_WithUntrustedCert_TrustsCertificate	▶️ View Recording
ConfigSetGet_CreatesNestedJsonFormat	▶️ View Recording
CreateAndRunAspireStarterProject	▶️ View Recording
CreateAndRunAspireStarterProjectWithBundle	▶️ View Recording
CreateAndRunEmptyAppHostProject	▶️ View Recording
CreateAndRunJavaEmptyAppHostProject	▶️ View Recording
CreateAndRunJsReactProject	▶️ View Recording
CreateAndRunPythonReactProject	▶️ View Recording
CreateAndRunTypeScriptEmptyAppHostProject	▶️ View Recording
CreateAndRunTypeScriptStarterProject	▶️ View Recording
CreateJavaAppHostWithViteApp	▶️ View Recording
CreateStartAndStopAspireProject	▶️ View Recording
CreateTypeScriptAppHostWithViteApp	▶️ View Recording
DashboardRunWithOtelTracesReturnsNoTraces	▶️ View Recording
DescribeCommandResolvesReplicaNames	▶️ View Recording
DescribeCommandShowsRunningResources	▶️ View Recording
DetachFormatJsonProducesValidJson	▶️ View Recording
DoctorCommand_DetectsDeprecatedAgentConfig	▶️ View Recording
DoctorCommand_WithSslCertDir_ShowsTrusted	▶️ View Recording
DoctorCommand_WithoutSslCertDir_ShowsPartiallyTrusted	▶️ View Recording
GlobalMigration_HandlesCommentsAndTrailingCommas	▶️ View Recording
GlobalMigration_HandlesMalformedLegacyJson	▶️ View Recording
GlobalMigration_PreservesAllValueTypes	▶️ View Recording
GlobalMigration_SkipsWhenNewConfigExists	▶️ View Recording
GlobalSettings_MigratedFromLegacyFormat	▶️ View Recording
InvalidAppHostPathWithComments_IsHealedOnRun	▶️ View Recording
LegacySettingsMigration_AdjustsRelativeAppHostPath	▶️ View Recording
LogsCommandShowsResourceLogs	▶️ View Recording
PsCommandListsRunningAppHost	▶️ View Recording
PsFormatJsonOutputsOnlyJsonToStdout	▶️ View Recording
PublishWithDockerComposeServiceCallbackSucceeds	▶️ View Recording
RestoreGeneratesSdkFiles	▶️ View Recording
RestoreSupportsConfigOnlyHelperPackageAndCrossPackageTypes	▶️ View Recording
RunFromParentDirectory_UsesExistingConfigNearAppHost	▶️ View Recording
RunWithMissingAwaitShowsHelpfulError	▶️ View Recording
SecretCrudOnDotNetAppHost	▶️ View Recording
SecretCrudOnTypeScriptAppHost	▶️ View Recording
StagingChannel_ConfigureAndVerifySettings_ThenSwitchChannels	▶️ View Recording
StopAllAppHostsFromAppHostDirectory	▶️ View Recording
StopAllAppHostsFromUnrelatedDirectory	▶️ View Recording
StopNonInteractiveMultipleAppHostsShowsError	▶️ View Recording
StopNonInteractiveSingleAppHost	▶️ View Recording
StopWithNoRunningAppHostExitsSuccessfully	▶️ View Recording

_{📹 Recordings uploaded automatically from CI run #23964436218}

JamesNK requested review from davidfowl and mitchdenny as code owners March 26, 2026 06:32

Copilot AI review requested due to automatic review settings March 26, 2026 06:32

JamesNK marked this pull request as draft March 26, 2026 06:33

Copilot started reviewing on behalf of JamesNK March 26, 2026 06:33 View session

Copilot AI reviewed Mar 26, 2026

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Comment thread src/Aspire.Cli/Commands/DashboardCommand.cs Outdated

Comment thread src/Aspire.Cli/Commands/DashboardCommand.cs Outdated

Comment thread src/Aspire.Cli/Commands/DashboardCommand.cs Outdated

Comment thread src/Aspire.Cli/Commands/DashboardCommand.cs Outdated

This was referenced Mar 28, 2026

Fix dashboard static files loading when working directory differs from executable location #12902

Closed

aspire dashboard - Start an empty dashboard #15674

Open

MihuBot mentioned this pull request Mar 28, 2026

[✨ Triage] microsoft/aspire#15674 by MermaidIsla - aspire dashboard - Start an empty dashboard MihuBot/dotnet-triage#174

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JamesNK force-pushed the cli-dashboard-command branch from 56a4214 to 2514d2c Compare March 30, 2026 12:57

JamesNK changed the title ~~Add 'aspire dashboard' CLI command~~ Add aspire dashboard CLI command and introduce unified IProcessExecutionFactory Mar 30, 2026

JamesNK marked this pull request as ready for review March 30, 2026 13:33

JamesNK requested a review from adamint as a code owner March 30, 2026 13:33

github-actions Bot mentioned this pull request Mar 30, 2026

[pull requests] Review required #13834

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adamint reviewed Mar 31, 2026

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JamesNK force-pushed the cli-dashboard-command branch from 87c7d5c to eb9af53 Compare April 1, 2026 05:19

JamesNK added the area-cli label Apr 1, 2026

JamesNK force-pushed the cli-dashboard-command branch from eb9af53 to 21da5d3 Compare April 1, 2026 09:21

davidfowl approved these changes Apr 2, 2026

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Add 'aspire dashboard' CLI command

6eeba7f

JamesNK force-pushed the cli-dashboard-command branch from 90950ec to 6eeba7f Compare April 3, 2026 21:33

JamesNK added 2 commits April 4, 2026 06:09

Fix duplicate TokenGenerator.cs compile include and update BundleNuGe…

87b6152

…tService constructor call

JamesNK changed the title ~~Add aspire dashboard CLI command and introduce unified IProcessExecutionFactory~~ Add aspire dashboard CLI command Apr 4, 2026

JamesNK merged commit ec8bbdf into main Apr 4, 2026
264 checks passed

JamesNK deleted the cli-dashboard-command branch April 4, 2026 00:12

MihuBot mentioned this pull request Apr 9, 2026

[✨ Triage] microsoft/aspire#16013 by afscrome - aspire cli commands don't support aspire-dashboard (possibly all ... MihuBot/dotnet-triage#189

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joperezr added this to the 13.3 milestone Apr 14, 2026

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Description

aspire dashboard command

Unified process execution infrastructure

Dashboard exit code tests

Validation

Checklist

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`aspire dashboard` command

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