Relocate api build output to a different location does not work as expected

[msedi]

Maybe a really stupid question. In our environment all our build output goes to a single _Build directory to have a single point to cleanup the project environment. Deleting the directory restores the project to zero.

Using docfx the default is that the api is built next to the docfx.json. To relocate the api into the _Build folder, I used:

 "metadata": [
    {
      "src": [
        {"src": "../Libraries/Dev", "files": ["**/*.csproj"]}
      ],
      "dest": "../_Build/docfx/api"
    }
  ],

and adapted the build to use the new folder

"build": {
    "content": [
      {"files": ["**/*.{md,yml}"]},
      {"files": ["**/*.{md,yml}"], "src": "../_Build/docfx/api/", "dest": "api/"}
    ],

This works fine, the api folder is relocated and the content is taken.
What does not work is that when it is relocated, the API cannot be reached anymore in toc.yml

- name: Introduction
  href: introduction.md
- name: Getting Started
  href: getting-started.md
- name: API
  href: api/

What I get when clicking on the API button to show the API, is simply a list of files, but API documentation page.
I assume its easy, but I didn't find how this should work.

Thanks for the help!

[calacayir]

In toc.yml, use src path which is relative to docfx.json:

- name: Introduction
  href: introduction.md
- name: Getting Started
  href: getting-started.md
- name: API
  href: ~/../_Build/docfx/api/

Note that in TOC, the href should match content src which is for .md and .yml and not dest which is for content output (.html).
You can use dest only if you know there will an index.html file in that output html folder.

What I get when clicking on the API button to show the API, is simply a list of files

This is because you use api/ which means _site/api/ but you don't have an index.html file in this output folder.
When you refer with ~/../_Build/docfx/api/ it will correctly find the correct .html file (e.g. first namespace html) even if you don't have a index.html file (generated by a index.md).