Compile Views in ASP.NET MVC

Question

I want an msbuild task to compile the views so I can see if there are compile time errors at well... compile time. Any ideas?

Answer 1

You can use aspnet_compiler for this:

C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\aspnet_compiler -v /Virtual/Application/Path/Or/Path/In/IIS/Metabase -p C:\Path\To\Your\WebProject -f -errorstack C:\Where\To\Put\Compiled\Site

where "/Virtual/Application/Path/Or/Path/In/IIS/Metabase" is something like this: "/MyApp" or "/lm/w3svc2/1/root/"

Also there is a AspNetCompiler Task on MSDN, showing how to integrate aspnet_compiler with MSBuild:

<Project xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003"&gt;
    <Target Name="PrecompileWeb">
        <AspNetCompiler
            VirtualPath="/MyWebSite"
            PhysicalPath="c:\inetpub\wwwroot\MyWebSite\"
            TargetPath="c:\precompiledweb\MyWebSite\"
            Force="true"
            Debug="true"
        />
    </Target>
</Project>

Answer 2

Next release of ASP.NET MVC (available in January or so) should have MSBuild task that compiles views, so you might want to wait.

See announcement

Answer 3

Also, if you use Resharper, you can active Solution Wide Analysis and it will detect any compiler errors you might have in aspx files. That is what we do...

Answer 4

From the readme word doc for RC1 (not indexed by google)

ASP.NET Compiler Post-Build Step

Currently, errors within a view file are not detected until run time. To let you detect these errors at compile time, ASP.NET MVC projects now include an MvcBuildViews property, which is disabled by default. To enable this property, open the project file and set the MvcBuildViews property to true, as shown in the following example:

<Project ToolsVersion="3.5" DefaultTargets="Build" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003"&gt;
  <PropertyGroup>
    <MvcBuildViews>true</MvcBuildViews>
  </PropertyGroup>

Note Enabling this feature adds some overhead to the build time.

You can update projects that were created with previous releases of MVC to include build-time validation of views by performing the following steps:

1. Open the project file in a text editor.
2. Add the following element under the top-most <PropertyGroup> element: <MvcBuildViews>true</MvcBuildViews>

3. At the end of the project file, uncomment the <Target Name="AfterBuild"> element and modify it to match the following

   <Target Name="AfterBuild" Condition="'$(MvcBuildViews)'=='true'"> <AspNetCompiler VirtualPath="temp" PhysicalPath="$(ProjectDir)..\$(ProjectName)" /> </Target>