Build Automation on Marko Apfel

Be careful when Git suppresses bin Folders

Fri, 05 Oct 2012 08:12:00 +0200

Initial situation

Often for Visual Studio projects the typical content of a .gitignore file contains this line

bin or
[B|b]in

It is used to avoid that Git tries to track compile outputs as repository relevant data.

Converting Creole to HTML, PDF, DOCX, ..

Fri, 24 Aug 2012 13:14:00 +0200

Challenge

We documented a project on Github with the Wiki there. For most articles we used Creole as markup language. Now we have to deliver a lot of the content to our client in an usual format like PDF or DOCX.

Installing of SDKs, Visual Studio and additional toolsets on build machines

Mon, 05 Dec 2011 15:07:00 +0100

Last week I get the information directly from Microsoft, that at build machines SDKs must be installed to guarantee that MSBuild works well in some circumstances.

We have the problem, that a self-containing build should include all necessary build artifacts – particularly Silverlight stuff. I tried to encapsulate the special steps in own targets and a build was finally possible (see my former posts). But at local machines without installed Silverlight stuff it gives problems for problems. Because reason of time finally I decide to go the Microsoft way – they break my volition.

@Microsoft: please provide universal and professional concepts

Sun, 20 Nov 2011 11:35:00 +0100

Why such constructs are included in the .csproj-Files?

<CodeAnalysisRuleSetDirectories>;c:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\Team Tools\Static Analysis Tools\\Rule Sets</CodeAnalysisRuleSetDirectories>

<CodeAnalysisRuleDirectories>;c:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\Team Tools\Static Analysis Tools\FxCop\\Rules</CodeAnalysisRuleDirectories>

So it every projects needs some manual steps to clean the project file so the solution could be build on a continuous integration server. That annoying!

Toolset agnostic build server and Silverlight projects

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 22:42:00 +0100

Problem

Normally I try to have my continuous integration as most a possible toolset free to ensure that no local stuff could have an impact to my build.

My Silverlight app references a special compile target in a folder outside my developer tree:

Setup license stuff for PostSharp 2.1

Tue, 08 Nov 2011 20:03:00 +0100

Problem

Normally PostSharp runs fine on unattended build servers. So on our global Jenkins continuous integration server PostSharp does the job.

But on my local TeamCity continuous integration server I got the following error:

MSB4067: The element beneath element is unrecognized.

Tue, 08 Nov 2011 11:32:00 +0100

Problem

Our global Jenkins continuous integration server throws this error during compile step. My local TeamCity continuous integration server runs fine. What is the difference.

Background

I integrate some static code analysis steps via MSBuild-targets in the csproj files.

Running StyleCop without an installation to empower continuous integration

Mon, 07 Nov 2011 22:32:00 +0100

Problem

A continuous integration server should only have a minimal toolset installed. This ensures that no unwanted libraries could affect the build and other steps.

Clearly that with this slogan also StyleCop should not be installed to the CI server. But we wanna have this analysis as an part of the whole build.

Note to self: Visual Studio makros for build events

Wed, 06 Jul 2011 10:01:00 +0200

Whitepaper “Aufbau eines pragmatisch smarten DevTree“

Wed, 15 Jun 2011 11:46:00 +0200

Motivation

Kommen Ihnen diese Szenarien bekannt vor:

der Build scheitert, weil ein Kollege ein 3rd Party Framework eingeführt hat und nur lokal auf seiner Maschine die benötigten Bibliotheken installiert sind
der Build scheitert weil ein 3rd Party Framework auf einigen Maschinen in anderen Versionen vorhanden ist und sich damit die Datei-Versionen und -Funktionalitäten der Bibliotheken unterscheiden
das Build-Ergebnis unterscheidet sich auf verschiedenen Maschinen weil jeweils andere Toolsets in die kompilierende Umgebung eingebunden sind (Code-Weaver und -Analysierer, die als Plugin in Visual Studio installiert sind)
die benötigten Fragmente für ein aktuell benötigtes MSI-Setup (z.B. PDF-Dokumentationen) liegen in der Verantwortlichkeit eines Kollegen, der diese Dateien auf seinem Laptop hat, mit welchem er gerade unterwegs ist
nach der Inbetriebnahme einer neuen Maschine sind stundenlange Installationsopern notwendig um wieder am Projekt mitarbeiten zu können
die ausgerollte Software läuft beim Kunden nicht, weil Bibliotheken in der Applikation referenziert wurde, welche nicht im Standard-Installationsumfang beim Kunden sind

Root Cause Analysis

Was ist der Grund all dieser und verwandter Probleme?

Calling esriRegasm manually (outside an ArcGIS-installation)

Tue, 26 Apr 2011 20:53:00 +0200

Since ArcGIS 10 during the Visual Studio build an additional target with the execution of a program named esriRegasm is called. Amongst other things this program adds the COM-categories in the registry.

Integrate Simian in Hudson CI-server

Wed, 07 Jul 2010 00:04:00 +0200

Steps to integrate simian

add simian to VCS
(in our case folder ./trunk/build/simian)
add build step to your Hudson job
(Execute Windows batch command)

use following two commands

.\trunk\build\Simian\bin\simian-2.2.24.exe
 -formatter=xml:.\trunk\bin\Simian.Result.xml
 -excludes=**/*.Test/**/*.cs
 -excludes=**/*.DbFrame/**/*.cs
 -excludes=**/*.DbLayout/**/*.cs
 -excludes=**/*.Designer.cs
 -excludes=**/XServer1\_8.cs
 -threshold=10
 **/*.cs
EXIT 0

Explanation

For better visibility and understanding I have split the first call (simian) over several lines. Needless to say that you must contract all parameters and arguments of the simian call in one line.

Working with Microsoft FxCop

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 09:06:00 +0100

Run FxCop as a post build event

Since FxCop 1.36 it is possible to include FxCop in a post-build event.

So FxCop runs after compiling in Visual Studio and allows you directly jumping to the warned line.

Post-build event with folders which contains spaces

Mon, 27 Apr 2009 03:47:00 +0200

If you want to use a Post-build event with folders which contains a space often you get an error like:

The system cannot find the file specified.

c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v3.5\Microsoft.Common.targets(3397,13):
error MSB3073: The command
"COPY C:\Projekte\_Learning By Doing\EsriDE.QA.StyleCop\bin\Debug\EsriDE.QA.StyleCop.dll
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft StyleCop 4.3""
exited with code 1.

In my case I used the macro $(TargetPath) in following line which contains indirectly the spaces in _Learning By Doing:

GACing und Kopieren nach dem Kompilieren

Thu, 08 Mar 2007 13:00:00 +0100

Beim Entwickeln eigener Functoide (Custom Functoids) und deren Verwendung im BizTalk Mapper muss das Kompilat sowohl in den GAC als auch ins Verzeichnis c:\Program Files\Microsoft BizTalk Server 2006\Developer Tools\Mapper Extensions kopiert werden.