I need some help to create a msbuild script.
We are using TeamCity 5.1.2, VS2010 (.net 4.0) and TFS in our environment. We have a "SharedLib" folder in tfs where we put those dll's that are used by multiple projects.
What we do is that we have a database project that handles db access and when we build that, a post build event copies the output dll to the SharedLib folder. Our "client" projects reference that dll from the SharedLib folder.
What I want to do is that when I check in files from the database project into tfs, the build is started in teamcity. If the build is successfull, I want to check out the database dll from the SharedLib folder in tfs, update the file with the new version and check in that file to tfs again.
How can I write a msbuild script that does that for me?
You can use the <EXEC $(TF) checkin ... /> command for that.
See http://blogs.msdn.com/b/nikhilsi/archive/2008/06/12/how-to-autoincrement-version-with-each-build-using-team-foundation-server-build-with-a-little-help-from-assemblyinfotask.aspx how you can use it.
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I am using TFS 2015 for creating builds of application. I am able to create build template for web application as web application have both .sln and .proj.
But for Websites, I only have .sln file and no .proj.
How can I create Build definition in TFS 2015 for website having only .sln file?
As #Cece said, the answer is yes, you can run the MSBuild on the server without a .csproj.
I am assuming that your project is not running on the final version of the .Net Framework. In your case I suggest you to make this change
https://stackoverflow.com/a/42493822/819153
Then you should copy all the files from the PrecompiledWeb folder, and there you should find your .sln
Sometimes there are vb/cs projects that I have seen that they do not come with a project file, csproj or vbproject. They run with the .NET Framework 2.0. For those, you can create a build definition just to compile the .sln, but when you deploy the application, you need to copy the entire PrecompiledWeb folder to the IIS folder on your server. Try to add the task that has the option copy and publish and put all the changes to your server.
Check the privilege of the folder where you want to put the files, and be sure that the agent that is running the builds on the TFS has access READ/WRITE access to the server folder.
In your case, please check the .sln file, inside of it you should have a TargetPath, by default is PrecompiledWeb, but sometimes when you run the msbuild on the tfs you end with an error saying that the PrecompiledWeb can't be on the same tree of your solution, what you need to do then is putting a level up of your solution folder
Debug.AspNetCompiler.TargetPath = "..\..\PrecompiledWeb\YourProject"
Then on your CopyTask you need to change the CopyRoot directory, if you made any transformation before your build step to the webconfig, those transformations will be reflected on the PrecomiledWeb\YourProject. All the files in that folder should be deployed to the server folder path.
Lets say that you have this structure in your Branch
Branch/MyProject, then after you compile the source code on the TFS, your precompiled folder will be stored at the same level of your project on the agents folder. Please see the picture below to get the idea how to copy the files from the PrecompiledWeb.
The answer is Yes. You can create a build definition for a WebSite project by specifying the .sln file.
I have a solution with bunch of C# projects with bunch of tests. Some of these tests require few native dlls (provided by related nuget packages). To address this .testsettings file was created that is copying dlls (that nuget coped to $(OutDir)) to test directory before running tests.
All this works fine on local machine, but when executed under TFS Build 'deployment' section of .testsettings file (or maybe entire file) gets ignored -- these dlls never materialize in test directory (nor there are any entries in the logs about them). .testsettings file is mentioned in related section of TFS build configuration.
Any ideas what could be wrong? (MSVC 2015, TFS 2013)
For TFS 2013, it only has XAML build. For XAML build, the testsetting file couldn't copy the assemblies from Nuget package $(OutDir) to the C:\Builds\...\builddefinition\...\TestSetting(tst)\...\Out folder before tests run.
I suggest that you could upgrade your TFS to TFS 2015 or upper version to use VNext build. And I have already tested that in Vnext build, it works. This is my build definition example: just add 3 steps.
Have you try to see if they are installed on your TFS server?
Did you check on GAC of the TFS server if they are registered?
Bellow is an explanation of how I deal with my dependencies, hope it helps.
This is my HMO about this topic. Must of the time I avoid to give the responsibility to the TFS to restore the NuGet packages in a separate folder.
How I do that?
1- I create a separate folder at the level of my project. (Common)
If you see on the bottom there is a Nuget.config file. Bellow is the configuration it has
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<configuration>
<config>
<add key="repositoryPath" value="$\..\Common\Packages" />
</config>
</configuration>
Now all my Packages are hosted inside Common folder. Now, place all you extra dlls there in a separate folder if you need. If you depend on native dlls that are hosted on the GAC, then you should take a look on the TFS Server if those are installed there.
With that said, I put all my project reference pointing to my Common folder, even my Nuget Repository is getting the files from that location also.
The advantage:
you centralize all your dlls(remember if you depend on a Native dlls, you should install on the TFS the version of the Framework you need in order to run the MSBuild correctly)
all projects point to the same dependencies
you just mantain the Common folder.
Once you check-in a package inside the Common folder, you are guaranteeing that the dependency is also hosted on the TFS, and when the MSBuild runs it can find them.
I have a TFS Build Definition that builds/deploys a web project to our internal IIS server. That works fine. However, I would also like to build/deploy a WinForms app (.exe) to the same web site.
I did add the WinForms solution to the Build Definition. TFS builds the .exe and copies it to the drops folder. But it's not in the _PublishedWebsites folder.
I've been manually copying the file over to the web site. Is there a way to automate this?
Thanks in advance!
In XAML build, you can check in your script, and specify a post-build script path in your XAML build definition. This script gathers some of the typical binary types from the typical locations and copies them to the folder from which TFBuild copies and drops to your staging location. Check more information about Run a script in your XAML build process at website: https://msdn.microsoft.com/library/dn376353%28v=vs.120%29.aspx
If you upgrade to TFS 2015, in the new build system, you can simply add a PublishBuildArtifacts task in your build definition. About how to use this task, check: https://www.visualstudio.com/en-us/docs/build/steps/utility/publish-build-artifacts
This is a winform application.
All dlls, exe and some other extension files are copied to the StartupProject\bin through the post build events(VS post-build).
On TFS Server, the project has 2 subfolders: bin and src.(bin contains required dlls, but other extensions are missing -.png, .dat, .xslx).
On the server, the post build copied files appear under the StartupProject\bin, but they are not copied to TFSFolder\bin.
How can I force copy all the StartupProj/bin to the TFSFolder\bin?
Team Build use a different directory layouts from Visual Studio builds. All Binaries go in a single folder for any project built, so references are automatically solved and it is easy to copy the DLL to the final Drop folder.
You should use $(OutDir) MSBuild variable to properly reference the binaries directory in VS and TFS builds. See Is there a single MSBuild and TFSBuild variable that will point to where the binaries are? for some details.
If you need to use different scripts for desktop (VS) and server (TFS) builds, use the $(BuildingInsideVisualStudio) variable as explained in TFS 2010 Build Automation and post-build event.
I have a website, a windows service, and some shared class libraries in a single Visual Studio solution. I use Octopack on both the website and windows service, and on my machine these builds work as expected.
When using the TFS Build Server, the website nuget package is generated as expected, but the windows service nuget package contains all files from the website, as well as the service. E.g. it includes the _PublishedWebsites folder as well.
This is because TFS uses a single location to build projects.
What is the best way around this?
I know this question has since been closed, but I cam across this issue and solved it in a different way.
My solution is compromised of a number of websites and windows services and had the same issue of the OctoPack created nuget packages including all the solution assemblies from the 'pooled' output folder when building with Team Build. The reason the nuget packages get all the assemblies is OctoPack uses the outdir msbuild argument as the location to include assemblies from.
The way I got around it was to use the msbuild argument GenerateProjectSpecificOutputFolder=true. This instructs Team build to create a folder for each project in your output folder in the same way Visual Studio uses the bin folders under each project when building locally.
My build definition msbuild arguments looks like:
/p:GenerateProjectSpecificOutputFolder=true;RunOctoPack=true;OctoPackPublishPackageToFileShare=\\<NugetServer>
I currently just push the packages onto a shared folder but the OctoPackPublishPackageToHttp and OctoPackPublishApiKey parameters can also be used.
The benefit of this solution over the one above is you don't need to specify the files to include the nuget package.
Hope this helps someone.
I ended up using this nuget package to ensure the console app built to a seperate directory on the TFS server.
https://nuget.org/packages/PublishedApplications/2.1.0.0
I then had to specify in the nuspec file, which files should be included for the console app. e.g
This works and I can now deploy using Octopus deploy.
The downside of this apporach is that the PublishedApplications build only works on the TFS build server, so I can't build the project locally in release mode. Still looking on how to overcome this.