build notification in visual Studio 2008\2010 - WMI etc

Question

I want to be notified when a build has been completed\failed in visual studio and I DO NOT want to use pre\post build steps, I want an external process or VS plugin that will count the number of builds.

So is there anyway to achieve this using something like WMI or other such technology?

I'm not interested in third party libaries, I want to write a plugin for visual studio.

Answer 1

There isn't. You can either use the pre/post build steps, or make an add-in. For the latter look for EnvDTE.BuildEvents. Let me know if you need a sample.

Any particular reasons you don't want to use the pre/post build steps, you can pretty much do anything with them, i.e. send mail, increment the file version information in AssemblyInfo etc.

Answer 2

The TFS PowerToys for 2008 or 2010 includes a build notification tool.

Answer 3

I am using this free VS plugin for Build status.

You can find it here.