We are using the BuildHTTPClient to programmatically create a copy of a build definition, update the variables in memory and then save the updated object as a new definition.
I'm using Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build2.WebApi.BuildHTTPClient 16.141. The TFS version is 17 update 3 (rest api 3.x)
This is a similar question to https://serverfault.com/questions/799607/tfs-buildhttpclient-updatedefinition-c-example but I'm trying to stay within using the BuildHttpClient libraries and not go directly to the RestAPIs.
The problem is the Steps list is always null along with other properties even though we have them in the build definition.
UPDATE Posted as an answer below
After looking at #Daniel Frosts attempt below we started looking at using older versions of the NuGet package. Surprisingly the supported version 15.131.1 does not support this but we have found out that the version="15.112.0-preview" does.
After rolling back all of our Dlls to match that version the steps were cloned when saving the new copy of the build.
All of the code examples we used work when you are using this package. We were unable to get Daniel's example working but the version of the Dll was the issue.
We need to create a GitHub issue and report it to MS
First Attempt - GetDefinitionAsync:
VssConnection connection = new VssConnection(DefinitionTypesDTO.serverUrl, new VssCredentials());
BuildHttpClient bdClient = connection.GetClient<BuildHttpClient>();
Task <BuildDefinition> resultDef = bdClient.GetDefinitionAsync(DefinitionTypesDTO.teamProjectName, buildID);
resultDef.Wait();
BuildDefinition updatedDefinition = UpdateBuildDefinitionValues(resultDef.Result, dr, defName);
updatedTask = bdClient.CreateDefinitionAsync(updatedDefinition, DefinitionTypesDTO.teamProjectName);
The update works on the variables and we can save the updated definition back to TFS but there are not any tasks in the newly created build definition. When we look at the object that is returned from GetDefinitionAsync we see that the Steps list is empty. It looks like GetDefinitionAsync just doesn't get the full object.
Second Attempt - Specific Revision:
int rev = 9;
Task <BuildDefinition> resultDef = bdClient.GetDefinitionAsync(DefinitionTypesDTO.teamProjectName, buildID, revision: rev);
resultDef.Wait();
BuildDefinition updatedDefinition = UpdateBuildDefinitionValues(resultDef.Result, dr, defName);
Based on SteveSims post we were thinking we are not getting the correct revision. So we added revision to the request. I see the same issue with the correct revision. Similarly to SteveSims post I can open the DefinitionURL in a browser and I see that the tasks are in the JSON in the browser but the BuildDefinition object is not populated with them.
Third Attempt - GetFullDefinition:
So then I thought to try getFullDefinition, maybe that's that "Full" means of course with out any documentation on these libraries I have no idea.
var task2 = bdClient.GetFullDefinitionsAsync(DefinitionTypesDTO.teamProjectName, "MyBuildDefName","$/","TfsVersionControl");
task2.Wait();
Still no luck, the Steps list is always null even though we have steps in the build definition.
Fourth Attempt - Save As Template
var task2 = bdClient.GetTemplateAsync DefinitionTypesDTO.teamProjectName, "1_Batch_Dev");
task2.Wait();
I tried saving the Build Definition off as a template. So in the Web UI I chose "Save as Template", still no steps.
Fifth Attempt: Using the URL as mentioned in SteveSims post:
Finally i said ok, i'll try the solution SteveSims used, using the webclient to get the object from the URL.
var client = new WebClient();
client.UseDefaultCredentials = true;
var json = client.DownloadString(LastDefinitionUrl);
//Convert the JSON to an actual builddefinition
BuildDefinition result = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<BuildDefinition>(json);
This also didn't work. The build definition steps are null. Even when looking at the Json object (var json) i see the steps. But the object is not loaded with them.
I've seen this post which seems to add the Steps to the base definition, i've tried this but honestly I'm having an issue understanding how he has modified the BuildDefinition Object when referencing that via NuGet?
https://dennisdel.com/blog/getting-build-steps-with-visual-studio-team-services-.net-api/
After looking at #Daniel Frosts attempt below we started looking at using older versions of the NuGet package. Surprisingly the supported version 15.131.1 does not support this but we have found out that the version="15.112.0-preview" does.
After rolling back all of our Dlls to match that version the steps were cloned when saving the new copy of the build.
All of the code examples above work when you are using this package. We were unable to get Daniel's example working but we didn't try hard as we had working code.
We need to create a GitHub issue for this.
Found this in my code, which works.
Use this package, not sure if it could have an impact (joke).
...packages\Microsoft.TeamFoundationServer.Client.15.112.1\lib\net45\Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build2.WebApi.dll
private Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.WebApi.BuildDefinition GetBuildDefinition(string projectName, string buildDefinitionName)
{
var buildDefinitionReferences = _buildHttpClient.GetFullDefinitionsAsync(projectName, "*", null, null, DefinitionQueryOrder.DefinitionNameAscending, top: 1000).Result;
return buildDefinitionReferences.SingleOrDefault(x => x.Name == buildDefinitionName && x.DefinitionQuality != DefinitionQuality.Draft);
}
With the newer clients Steps will always be empty. In newer api-versions (which are used by the newer clients) the steps have moved to Phases. If you use GetDefinitions or GetFullDefinitions and look in
definition.Process.Phases[0].Steps
you'll find them. (GetDefinitions gets shallow references so the process won't be included.)
The Steps collection still exists for compatibility reasons (we don't want apps to crash with stuff like MethodNotFoundExceptions) but it won't be populated.
I was having this problem, although I able to get Phases[0] information at runtime, but could not get it at design time. I solved this problem using dynamic type.
dynamic process = buildDefTemplate.Process;
foreach (BuildDefinitionStep tempStep in process.Phases[0].Steps)
{
// do some work here
}
Not, it is working!
Microsoft.TeamFoundationServer.Client version 16.170.0 I can get build steps through process.Phases[0].Steps only with process and step being dynamic as #whitecore above stated
var definitions = buildClient.GetFullDefinitionsAsync(project: project.Name);
foreach (var definition in definitions.Result)
{
Console.WriteLine(string.Format("\n {0} - {1}:", definition.Id, definition.Name));
dynamic process = definition.Process;
foreach (dynamic step in process.Phases[0].Steps)
{
Console.WriteLine(step.DisplayName);
}
}
TFS 2012
VS 2012
I have large number of Build Definitions that are derived from single template.
I also have a Master Build to queue all those builds and pass arguments if I need to do so.
That part was done using TFS Community Extension: QueueBuilds.
Problem:
Is there a way to access Build Definitions, loop through them, (can get up to here by myself) and change their ProcessParameters and save them.
You can use the Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.Client and related assemblies to update the process parameters via PowerShell or C#. The one tricky part is the parameters are stored in XML so you have to deserialize, make your changes, then serialize again to set them.
This likely won't run without some tweaking but here are some snippets from one of my scripts that will help:
[void][Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName('Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.Client')
[void][Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName('Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.Workflow')
$projectCollection = [Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Client.TfsTeamProjectCollectionFactory]::GetTeamProjectCollection($TFSUri)
$buildServer = $projectCollection.GetService([Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.Client.IBuildServer]) $buildServer = GetBuildServer -TFSUri $TFSUri
$buildDefinition = $buildServer.GetBuildDefinition($TeamProjectName, $BuildName);
...
$parameters = [Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.Workflow.WorkflowHelpers]::DeserializeProcessParameters($buildDefinition.ProcessParameters)
$msBuildArguments = $parameters.Get_Item("MSBuildArguments")
$msBuildArguments = "$msBuildArguments /p:ImportParametersFilesOverride=true"
$parameters.Set_Item("MSBuildArguments", $msBuildArguments)
$parameters.Add("GetVersion", "c$TFSChangeSetNumber")
$buildRequest.ProcessParameters = [Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.Workflow.WorkflowHelpers]::SerializeProcessParameters($parameters)
I'm used to working with TeamCity so it might be that I should completely change my workflow, in that case answer with a suggestion of a new workflow instead.
In TeamCity I usually build and run unit tests as one build task (at every commit). Longer running tests are scheduled nightly and are run in the same way. So far I've manged to replicate the process in TFS. But on top of this I have a build task to deploy/publish a package. This is something I start manually once we are ready for it. This script references the artifact from a previous build (i.e. a drop folder or a drop zip in TFS).
I've read this article about deployment scripts but I can't find any information about how I can trigger them in TFS.
So the question in short: How do I reference a "drop as zip" or a drop folder instead of the source when building in TFS?
You can "Get Specific Build" or the "Latest Successful Build" on a specific Build, and then you can refer to that build's drop location.
Using TFS API, getting latest one should look something like this:
using (TfsTeamProjectCollection tpc = TfsTeamProjectCollectionFactory.GetTeamProjectCollection(new Uri("http://tfsserver:8080/tfs/DefaultCollection")))
{
var buildServer= tpc.GetService<IBuildServer>();
var buildSpec = buildServer.CreateBuildDetailSpec(teamProjectName, buildDefinition);
buildSpec.InformationTypes = null;
buildSpec.MinFinishTime = DateTime.Now.AddHours(-lastXHours);
buildSpec.MaxBuildsPerDefinition = 1;
buildSpec.QueryOrder = Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.Client.BuildQueryOrder.FinishTimeDescending;
buildSpec.Status=Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.Client.BuildStatus.Succeeded;
var buildDetails = buildServer.QueryBuilds(buildSpec).Builds;
if (buildDetails.Length ==1){var dropLocation= buildDetails[0].DropLocation; }
else { Console.WriteLine("No builds found." );}
}
We are trying to have ReSharper's cleanup code run on TFS Checkin. Ideally, when you right click on the solution / project and select Source Control > Check in all the files in the "Included Changes" should run cleanup code. I've got the custom checkin policy to work to some extent, works fine if you select a single file to check in but when you select the solution or project, it tries to run cleanup code on the entire solution / project and not just the files selected in TFS Pending Changes "Include Changes".
I'm running VS 2013 with R# 8.2. My policy evaluate code:
public override PolicyFailure[] Evaluate()
{
if (PendingCheckin.Policies.EvaluationState == PolicyEvaluationState.Unevaluated)
{
DTE2 dte = PendingCheckin.GetService(typeof (DTE)) as DTE2;
foreach (EnvDTE.Document doc in dte.Documents)
{
doc.DTE.ExecuteCommand("ReSharper_SilentCleanupCode");
}
}
return new PolicyFailure[0];
}
I don't think this only applies to ReSharper, executing "Edit.FormatDocument" here would most likely run on all files as well.
Is there a way to run ExecuteCommand on only 1 file / document?
It seems like
PendingCheckin.GetService(typeof (DTE))
only gets files that are open in the Visual Studio editor not all the files that are in the "Include Changes" list. I can get a list of PendingChange through
PendingCheckin.PendingChanges.CheckedPendingChanges
But I don't know how to execute a command on PendingChange. Recommendations here would help
PS: I've read that the check in policy is meant to be used for checking documents only, however this workflow is what we need.
In order to retrieve the information which Changeset was included in which Build, we use "Label Sidekick" of Team Foundation Sidekicks, where we place the Label of the Build & expect to find the newly built Changeset.
Our development process in TFS 2010 is making use of 'Gated' checkins, so we are faced with the situation that the latest checkins are not presented in Sidekicks (we actually receive the changeset of the previous build). This is explainable, since at the time the labeling takes place, the latest changes have not yet been committed.
The BuildLog does report the associated Changeset correctly.
I 've made several experiments in our Build Process Template but can't seem to get what we need.
Placing, for example, the Labeling activity out of the "Run On Agent" scope, lead me to a build that fails at the very start with an "Object reference not set to an instance of an object." (I suppose this is related with fact I had to widen the scope for 'Label' & 'Workspace' variables to get the second part running).
The 'before' state of the build process template for this attempt is here (this works), the 'after' state ("Object ref not set..") is here.
So, to summarize, two different types of input could help me out:
How should I change our build process template so that the labeling happens after the Gated checkins have been committed? (-- This would rationalize the display in Sidekicks)
or
How can I programmatically retrieve the associated Changeset of each Build? (-- This would enable me to write a small app that could obsolete the Sidekicks angle)
You can use the TFS API to get this done.
public static void GetBuild()
{
var tfs = TfsTeamProjectCollectionFactory.GetTeamProjectCollection(new Uri("http://tfsdevlonuk:8080/tfs/gazprom.mt"), new UICredentialsProvider());
tfs.EnsureAuthenticated();
var buildServer = tfs.GetService<IBuildServer>();
// Get Project Name
var versionControl = tfs.GetService<VersionControlServer>();
var teamProjects = versionControl.GetAllTeamProjects(true);
// Get Builds for a team project
var buildDetails = buildServer.QueryBuilds(teamProjects[0].Name);
// For each build
foreach (IBuildDetail buildDetail in buildDetails)
{
// Get the build details
var buildInfor = buildDetail.Information;
// More build infor like shelveset, etc
Debug.Write(buildDetail.LabelName + buildDetail.ShelvesetName);
}
The above code will help you get the build details programatically. I have some blog posts on how to connect to tfs programmatically and use the tfs api. http://geekswithblogs.net/TarunArora/archive/2011/06/18/tfs-2010-sdk-connecting-to-tfs-2010-programmaticallyndashpart-1.aspx