I am attempting to dynamically generate a SQL script using MSBuild. The script is responsible for updating some tables etc... post-build.
One of the requirements of this script is to retrieve the product's release notes from a text file and place them into an insert statement in the SQL script.
I'm using TemplateFile to replace the values in a template and generate the SQL script, and it's working as expected. My problem begins when I attempt to read the release notes file. The following is my code:
<PropertyGroup>
<SQLFileTemplate>Update Product Table.template</SQLFileTemplate>
<SQLFileName>Update Product Table.sql</SQLFileName>
<ReleaseNotesFile>Release Notes.txt</ReleaseNotesFile>
</PropertyGroup>
<ReadLinesFromFile File="$(ReleaseNotesFile)">
<Output TaskParameter="Lines" ItemName="FileContents" />
</ReadLinesFromFile>
<ItemGroup>
<Tokens Include="releaseDate">
<ReplacementValue>$(buildDate)</ReplacementValue>
</Tokens>
<Tokens Include="releaseNotes">
<!--Escape the CR LF because MSBuild will replace them with semicolon-->
<ReplacementValue>#(FileContents, '%0a%0d')</ReplacementValue>
</Tokens>
<Tokens Include="releaseLevel">
<ReplacementValue>0</ReplacementValue>
</Tokens>
<Tokens Include="currentVersionInts">
<ReplacementValue>#(versionInts)</ReplacementValue>
</Tokens>
<Tokens Include="currentVersion">
<ReplacementValue>$(GuiVersion)</ReplacementValue>
</Tokens>
<Tokens Include="productVersionId">
<ReplacementValue>$(productId)</ReplacementValue>
</Tokens>
</ItemGroup>
<TemplateFile Template="$(SQLFileTemplate)" OutputFileName="$(SQLFileName)" Tokens="#(Tokens)" />
When I do this, the file is read but it's just put into single spacing and the format is completely gone. I've looked at ReadTextFromFile in MSBuild.Community.Tasks.FileSystem but I can't figure out the syntax.
Can someone give me a hand for this?
Looks like you trying to replace tokens in a file? I don't think you need to go through read and write the file.
You can use the detokenise task in the extension pack to achieve the same results. See: http://www.msbuildextensionpack.com/help/4.0.4.0/index.html
Although i do use the community tasks I think the extension pack has a lot more to offer than the community tasks.
Related
I have a bunch of files x.txt in various directories throughout my project. As part of my build step, I would like to collect these and place them in a single folder (without needing to declare each one). I can detect them by using:
<ItemGroup>
<MyFiles Include="$(SRCROOT)\**\x.txt"/>
</ItemGroup>
However, if I copy these to a single folder - they all overwrite each other. I have tried using a transform where I append a GUID to each file name, but the GUID is only created once, and then re-used for each transform (thus they overwrite each over). Is there a way of generating unique names in MSBuild when copying an ItemGroup with identically named files? The end naming scheme is not important, as long as all the files end up in that folder.
The transform works but you have to 'force' it to generate new data on each iteration. It took me a while to figure that out and it makes sense now but I couldn't find any documentation explaining this. But it works simply by referencing other existing metadata: msbuild sees that has to be evaluated on every iteration so it will happily evaluate anything part of the new metadata. Example, simply using %(FileName):
<Target Name="CreateUniqueNames">
<ItemGroup>
<MyFiles Include="$(SRCROOT)\**\x.txt"/>
<MyFiles>
<Dest>%(Filename)$([System.Guid]::NewGuid())%(FileName)</Dest>
</MyFiles>
</ItemGroup>
<Message Text="%(MyFiles.Identity) -> %(MyFiles.Dest)"/>
</Target>
Alternatively you can make use of the unique metadata you already have namely RecursiveDir:
<Target Name="CreateUniqueNames">
<ItemGroup>
<MyFiles Include="$(SRCROOT)\**\x.txt"/>
<MyFiles>
<Dest>x_$([System.String]::Copy('%(RecursiveDir)').Replace('\', '_')).txt</Dest>
</MyFiles>
</ItemGroup>
<Message Text="%(MyFiles.Identity) -> %(MyFiles.Dest)"/>
</Target>
I have been attempting to use the zip task of msbuild in a project I am working on at the moment.
My project file looks something like this:
<PropertyGroup> <MSBuildCommunityTasksPath>$(SolutionDir)\.build</MSBuildCommunityTasksPath> </PropertyGroup>
<Import Project="$(MSBuildCommunityTasksPath)\MSBuild.Community.Tasks.Targets" />
<ItemGroup>
<FileToZip include="C:\FilePath"></FilesToZip>
<FileToZip include="C:\FilePath"></FilesToZip>
</ItemGroup>
<Target Name="BeforeBuild">
<PropertyGroup>
<ReleasePath>\releasepath</ReleasePath>
<Zip Files="#(FilesToZip)" WorkingDirectory="$(ReleasePath)" ZipFileName="HTMLeditor.html" ZipLevel="9" />
</Target>
However, the zip file updates but does not contain the files specified in the item group FilesToZip. I cannot figure out why they aren't being recognised! I have double checked file paths and they are correct. Any ideas?
I think you want to do something like this:
<ItemGroup>
<FileToZip include="C:\FilePath;C:\FilePath"/>
</ItemGroup>
As I mentioned in my comment, simply creating a variable (FileToZip) and repeating it twice with different values does not give you an array that contains both of the values. You end up with only the last value (and not an array at all). Your include attribute is a selector which is used to build the array and it can contain multiple values, wildcards and other patterns which are used to build out that array for you.
Here's a link to MSDN that gives you more information on how to use the Include attribute: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms171454.aspx
I ditched the ItemGroup in the end, and went with another way of doing it.
<Target Name="Zip">
<CreateItem Include="FilesToInclude" >
<Output ItemName="ZipFiles" TaskParameter="Include"/>
<Zip ZipFileName="ZipFile.zip" WorkingDirectory="FolderToWriteZipTo" Files="#(ZipFiles)" />
</Target>
This method seemed to be easier and wasn't adding files to the root of the file.
Thanks for the help though guys.
I want to write a number in a text file using WriteLinesToFile but the task is putting a line feed at the end which causes me trouble when i want to read or combine in other places
Example:
<WriteLinesToFile File="$(TextFile)" Lines="#(BuildNumber)" Overwrite="true"/>
UPDATE as the user comment below:
The problem that I had was that I was using a very simple command in Property to read the content of a file $([System.IO.File]::ReadAllText("$(TextFile)")) and I really want to use this one but it also included the line feed from WriteLinesToFiles. I ended up using similar solution like yours using ReadLinesFromFile.
There is a slight dissconnect between the title and the description. I would have liked to post this "answer" as an edit, but do not have enough reputation points :)
Do you have a problem with the newline at the end of a file, or do you have a problem ignoring that newline? Could you please clarify?
One way how I suppose you could ignore that newline follows.
This small snippet of code writes a build number to a file, then reads it out and then increments the number read by 1.
<Target Name="Messing_around">
<PropertyGroup>
<StartBuildNumber>1</StartBuildNumber>
</PropertyGroup>
<ItemGroup>
<AlsoStartBuildNumber Include="1"/>
</ItemGroup>
<!-- Use a property
<WriteLinesToFile File="$(ProjectDir)test.txt" Lines="$(StartBuildNumber)" Overwrite="true"/>
-->
<WriteLinesToFile File="$(ProjectDir)test.txt" Lines="#(AlsoStartBuildNumber)" Overwrite="true"/>
<ReadLinesFromFile File="$(ProjectDir)test.txt">
<Output
TaskParameter="Lines"
ItemName="BuildNumberInFile"/>
</ReadLinesFromFile>
<PropertyGroup>
<OldBuildNumber>#(BuildNumberInFile)</OldBuildNumber>
<NewBuildNumber>$([MSBuild]::Add($(OldBuildNumber), 1))</NewBuildNumber>
</PropertyGroup>
<Message Importance="high" Text="Stored build number: #(BuildNumberInFile)"/>
<Message Importance="high" Text="New build number: $(NewBuildNumber)"/>
</Target>
And this is what I see
Output:
1>Build started xx/xx/xxxx xx:xx:xx.
1>Messing_around:
1> Stored build number: 1
1> New build number: 2
1>
1>Build succeeded.
If you attempting to read, in an MSBuild Task, a single line containing only a number from a file with a trailing line feed, then you should not have a problem.
As a side note: With the little information at hand I'd assume that BuildNumber is an Item in an ItemGroup. If you have only one build number to deal with, perhaps Property may have been an option. But then, again, I haven't been tinkering with MSBuild for too long. So, I am open to feedback on the Item vs Property issue.
I'm trying to combine all javascript files in a project during the build process, but it just isn't working for me. Here's what I have:
<Target Name="CombineJS">
<CreateItem Include=".\**\*.js">
<Output TaskParameter="Include" ItemName="jsFilesToCombine" />
</CreateItem>
<ReadLinesFromFile File="#(jsFilesToCombine)">
<Output TaskParameter="Lines" ItemName="jsLines" />
</ReadLinesFromFile>
<WriteLinesToFile File="all.js" Lines="#(jsLines)" Overwrite="true" />
</Target>
MSBuild is throwing an error on the ReadLinesFromFile line saying there's an invalid value for the "File" parameter. (No error when there's only one file to combine)
So, two questions:
What am I doing wrong?
Is there a better way to combine files within an MSBuild task? I ask this question because I know that my current process removes all tabs and blank lines, which for me isn't that big of a deal, but still kind of annoying.
Change line 6 to:
<ReadLinesFromFile File="%(jsFilesToCombine.FullPath)">
The # operator is used when the input is ItemGroup which is essentially a semicolon-delimited list of strings.
The % operator is for expanding ItemGroups into strings (properties).
The ReadLinesFromFileTask you are using to read the files takes a single file as input to the File property (MSDN). You can't use this task to read lines from multiple files at once. You may however be able to use batching to run the task several times for each file.
I need to read the XML from the file. I use following code:
<ItemGroup>
<SourceXsltFile Include="SourceFile.xml" />
</ItemGroup>
<ReadLinesFromFile File="#(SourceXsltFile)">
<Output TaskParameter="Lines" ItemName="FileContents" />
</ReadLinesFromFile>
But I need only the part of the file's content to be copied which resides inside the <XSL> tag.
Any ideas?
In 4.0+ there are XmlPeek, XmlPoke, and XslTransform tasks you can use here. See MSDN.
http://msbuildtasks.tigris.org/ - use RegexMatch task with something like - <XSL\b[^>]*>(.*?)</XSL> (not sure about exact correctness though).
Write your own custom task