Visual Studio Build Tasks - TFS Operations

Question

I'm looking to extend some post build tasks to include the checking out and then checking in of a DLL. We are using TFS and I know there are command line tools to do this. What I don't know how to do is to integrate these into my existing post build tasks. Right now my post build tasks are simple and are managed in Visual Studio through the project properties. Eventually I want to break out my custom build tasks into external files and call them in, but that is the subject of another question ;)

Answer 1

You could use the Team Foundation Server client API. TeamFoundationServer is the base class that should allow you to connect to a server, list and manipulate TFS projects.

Answer 2

Msbuildtasks has some extensions for msbuild with sourcecode (its opensource). You could use this to create your own checkin/checkout functionality. (in combination with what Darin suggests)

http://msbuildtasks.tigris.org/

Answer 3

Without resorting to custom Build tasks you could try to use the Team Foundation Source Control Command-Line tool (tf.exe).

The example below shows how to use tf.exe to check out a file from TFS.

<PropertyGroup>
    <TfCommand>
        &quot;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\IDE\tf.exe&quot;
    </TfCommand>
</PropertyGroup>

<Target Name="AfterCompile">
    <Exec Command="$(TfCommand) get /force /noprompt &quot;$(SolutionRoot)\sources\example.cs&quot;"
        ContinueOnError="true" />
    <Exec Command="$(TfCommand) checkout &quot;$(SolutionRoot)\sources\example.cs&quot;"
        ContinueOnError="true"/>
</Target>

Include this in your own MSBuild project file.

This example doesn't do anything useful and you need to change it to match your environment, but maybe it gives you a start.

I got this example from tfsbuild.com.

Answer 4

Take a look at the SDC Tasks Library on CodePlex. It's a set of custom MSBuild tasks that includes Checkin and Checkout tasks (see the Microsoft.Sdc.Tasks.SourceTfs namespace in the accompanying documentation). You can incorporate these tasks in the "AfterBuild" target in your project file.

<SourceTfs.Checkout Path="Path" TfsVersion="tfsVersion"
WorkingDirectory="workingDirectory"/>

<SourceTfs.Checkin Path="Path" Comments="Comments" TfsVersion="tfsVersion" 
WorkingDirectory="workingDirectory" Override="overrideText"/>

You would set TfsVersion to "2005" or "2008" as appropriate.

Answer 5

Our team has several small projects which output DLL's used by several other projects. Part of our release is to publish these DLL's. I use the AfterDropBuild target for this. Hopefully the comments in my build script snippet are clear enough to show what I am doing.

<!-- Get a reference to the new release address finalizer DLL and the existing published address finalizer DLL  -->
<PropertyGroup>
  <ReleaseDLL>$(DropLocation)\$(BuildNumber)\Release\Address_Finalizer.dll</ReleaseDLL>
  <PublishedFolder>$(SolutionRoot)\3rd Party\bin\PG File Import</PublishedFolder>
  <PublishedDLL>$(PublishedFolder)\Address_Finalizer.dll</PublishedDLL>
</PropertyGroup>

<!-- Check out the published DLL -->
<Exec WorkingDirectory="$(SolutionRoot)" Command='$(TfCommand) checkout /lock:checkout "$(PublishedDLL)"'/>

<!-- Copy release to published -->
<Copy SourceFiles="$(ReleaseDLL)" DestinationFolder="$(PublishedFolder)"/>

<!-- Check in the published DLL -->
<Exec WorkingDirectory="$(SolutionRoot)" Command='$(TfCommand) checkin /override:Automated /noprompt /comment:"$(VersionComment)" "$(PublishedDLL)"'/>