Building with MSBuild 14.0/C# 6.0 in AppVeyor - msbuild

I am trying build a library with C# 6.0 code in AppVeyor. I have tried configurations in this update from AppVeyor, this discussion and this blog post.
Here's what I did:
Select Visual Studio 2015 as operating system from AppVeyor web interface
Add MSBuild 14.0 folder to the path (tried both from web interface and appveyor.yml)
SET PATH=C:\Program Files (x86)\MSBuild\14.0\Bin\;%PATH%
Changed these lines in solution file
# Visual Studio 14
VisualStudioVersion = 14.0.23107.0
Tried to invoke MSBuild with custom build script
None of these worked. It still picks up MSBuild 12.0 and fails. What else can I try? There are people who got it working, I can't see what I'm missing.

In addition to what you tried above, you need to make sure you used the Visual Studio 2015 image.

Related

Common MACROS for C# Project in Visual Studio 2022

I have converted a VS 2019 using .NET 4.8 csproj file to VS 2022 using .NET 5.0
Everything builds however my post processing command fails.
It uses $(TargetPath) which seems to be no longer available.
What do we use instead?
Found the answer here PostEvents
in other words take a copy of your PostBuild event script, edit your project file and delete the PostBuild event section. The open the project file in Visual Studio and recreate the PostBuild event. This will create it using Targets

What must be done to make net5.0 usable in Visual Studio Community Mac 2019 for VB.NET console projects?

I want to write a cross-platform console application in VB.NET using Visual Studio Community Mac 2019 [VSCM2019]. It has to be able to be run on all platforms that dotnet 5.x currently supports.
When I create a new VB.NET console application in VSCM2019 it defaults to NET Frameworks 4.8 or lower. When I try to change that to net5.x in the project properties, net5.x is not offered in the dropdown list despite the fact that I have installed the latest dotnet 5 sdk.
Is it the case that I must select net5.x when creating the project? If so, where is this done for VB.NET console applications?
Whether or not VB.NET is supported or not, I managed to hack it into submission. I created a net5 C# project, renamed the .csproj file to .vbproj and replaced the .cs file with a .vb file. Instead of opening VS via the .sln file, I opened it via the .vbproj file. It compiled and ran and the project properties reflected the change to VB.NET. I then replaced the .sln by saving the project.

TeamCity build fails without windows kits reference in proj file

I'm having an issue on teamcity (9.1.7). I don't have visual studio installed on the build server. I have installed visual studio test agents and msbuild tools. Building one of the project fails with this error-
C:\Program Files (x86)\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v12.0\AppxPackage\Microsoft.AppXPackage.Targets(694, 9): error APPX1639: File 'Windows.props' not found. See http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?prd=12395&pver=1.0&plcid=0x409&ar=MSDN&sar=PlatformMultiTargeting&o1=Portable&o2=7.0 for more information
The link doesn't work. After looking up the error, it seems i need to install Windows Kits and I need to add this to my csproj file under the first property group -
<_WindowsKitBinPath>C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\bin\x86</_WindowsKitBinPath>
<_WindowsPhoneKitBinPath>C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Phone Kits\8.1\bin</_WindowsPhoneKitBinPath>
<MakePriExeFullPath>$(_WindowsKitBinPath)\makepri.exe</MakePriExeFullPath>
<MakeAppxExeFullPath>$(_WindowsKitBinPath)\makeappx.exe</MakeAppxExeFullPath>
<SignAppxPackageExeFullPath>$(_WindowsKitBinPath)\signtool.exe</SignAppxPackageExeFullPath>
<MakePriExtensionPath>$(_WindowsPhoneKitBinPath)\x86\MrmEnvironmentExtDl.dll</MakePriExtensionPath>
<MakePriExtensionPath_x64>$(_WindowsPhoneKitBinPath)\x64\MrmEnvironmentExtDl.dll</MakePriExtensionPath_x64>
I really don't want to add this to my csproj file. I don't know why it is required/what impact it has. Can someone explain to me why this is needed? When i build my solution locally with visual studio, it works fine.
The groups of settings are basically bootstrapping parameters that are required by MSBuild in order to compile the project (A native windows phone app??). You've probably got the kit installed locally and something already integrated into Visual Studio, which is why it builds. Uninstall the Visual Studio add-in and it'll probably start failing.
You can setup your compile step to pass in these parameters without requiring them in the .csproj file if you don't want them there.
I normally abstract additional build parameters to a variable in TeamCity
Hope this helps

Why can't MSBuild ToolsVersion 4.0 build older projects?

We're using Cruse Control to manage our build process.
AS we convert vs2008 projects to vs2010, we're leaving the target framework set at 3.5 for web and class library projects.
At this point we're not going through and converting all our solutions to vs2010; not if we don't have to.
I recently updated the MSbuild project files that cruise control uses to point at MSBuild 4.0 so our build process would be able to build vs2010 projects.
C:\windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\MSBuild.exe
All was well until a web project that was targeting the 4.0 framework was committed.
At which point this error popped up:
CS0433: The type 'System.Web.Routing.RouteCollection' exists in both c:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\assembly\GAC_32\System.Web\v4.0_4.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.Web.dll and c:\Program Files (x86)\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework\v3.5\System.Web.Routing.dll in Global.asax.cs(15, 43)
At which point I became aware of the Windows/Microsoft.NET/Assembly folders.
Now... All the MSBuild projects, even though they were using MSBuild 4.0, still had the tools version set at 3.5.
So why was a 3.5 targeted build looking at the new 4.0 assembly folders and finding this conflict? Probably because I was using MSBuild 4.0. But if I can change the toolVersion that MSBuild uses, you'd think I can tell it to target 3.5 without worrying about these potential conflicts.
To resolve this issue, I went to the relevant MSBuild project files that cruise control uses and changed their toolsVersion to 4.0. This got passed that conflict error. But now everytime it tries to build a project that's in a solution that we haven't yet converted to a vs2010 project, it breaks with an error like this:
MyProject.csproj in SomeFilePath:
LC0000: 'Could not load file or assembly or one of its dependencies. This assembly is built by a runtime newer than the currently loaded runtime and cannot be loaded.' in LC(0, 0)
If I open the solution that contains that project in Visual Studio 2010 and do the conversion, build it and commit that and force another build, I get passed that error only to find that another not yet converted project is tossing that same error.
So now I am for sure using MSBuild 4.0 and for real targeting the 4.0 framework. Why can't 4.0 build 3.5 projects or vs2008 solution projects?
The issue is that you have migrated part of your projects to to visual studio 2010. Any 2008 project that references a 2010 project (by project reference) will give you this compile time error. Try updating all .csproj files to 2010 and try rebuilding again.

How to run .NET 4 code analysis on build server

On a Windows Server 2003 R2 with .NET 4 SDK but without Visual Studio 2010, I have tried building a Visual Studio 2010 solution with
msbuild MySolution.sln /p:RunCodeAnalysis=true
but that fails.
What is required to run code analysis on such an environment?
I get this error message:
C:\Program Files (x86)\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v10.0\CodeAnalysis\Microsoft.CodeAnalysis.targets(129,9): error MSB6003:
The specified task executable "FxCopCmd.exe" could not be run.
Could not load file or assembly
'Microsoft.VisualStudio.CodeAnalysis.Sdk, Version=10.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken= b03f5f7f11d50a3a'
or one of its dependencies.
The system cannot find the file specified.
I have installed FxCop from the SDK and without luck pointed the variable FxCopDir to the installed location of FxCopCmd.exe, and also setting this registry entry to that location:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\10.0\Setup\EDev#FxCopDir
I had the same problem on my MSBuild server and fixed it by:
Installing Windows SDK 7.1
Setting up the registry keys FxCopDir and StanDir in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\10.0\Setup\EDev (in Win32).
I then copied over from the dev PC, to the FxCop folder on the build server, the following:
The folder Rule Sets (default installation target is here: C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 14.0\Team Tools\Static Analysis Tools\FxCop)
Microsoft.VisualStudio.CodeAnalysis.Sdk.dll
Microsoft.VisualStudio.CodeAnalysis.Phoenix.dll
phx.dll
Do a search for them on your dev PC with Visual Studio installed to locate them.
Then use the .NET 4.0 version of gacutil.exe to install Microsoft.VisualStudio.CodeAnalysis.Sdk.dll to the GAC.
You should then be able to run code analysis as part of an MSBuild build and have it work properly.
An alternative to FxCop would be to use the tool NDepend that lets write Code Rules over C# LINQ Queries (namely CQLinq). Disclaimer: I am one of the developers of the tool
More than 200 code rules are proposed by default. Customizing existing rules or creating your own rules is straightforward thanks to the well-known C# LINQ syntax.
Rules can be verified live in Visual Studio and at Build Process time, in a generated HTML+javascript report.
Another option might be calling FxCop executable as a build task (from msbuildtasks), saving the result as an XML file that can be parsed within most of the CI tools (like Hudson and CC.NET)