Adding files to Azure cspkg in afterbuild msbuild event? - msbuild

Question

I have an MVC application which I have got working on Azure apart from getting the published .cspkg file to include css/jscript that is created in an afterbuild process (this works if I publish to a normal server which isn't using Azure).
In the afterbuild process I minify and merge files then add them to a deploy zip:
<PackageLocation>..\Deploy\Website.zip</PackageLocation>
<PropertyGroup>
<CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn>
CustomCollectFiles;
$(CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn);
</CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn>
</PropertyGroup>
What MSBuild code do I need to change in order to do the same task but adding to the cspkg instead?

Answer 1

Here is how I just did it. In this example I have a .csproj file that is part of an Azure solution and the dll produced by my C# project needs a particular Xml file to live right next to it in the deployment. Here are some msbuild fragments from my .csproj file that show the technique. You can place all of this code below the import of Microsoft.CSharp.targets in your .csproj file.
<!-- Identify the Xml input file that must be deployed next to our dll. -->
<ItemGroup>
<SpecialXmlFileItem Include="c:\temp\MySpecialFile.xml" />
</ItemGroup>
<PropertyGroup>
<!-- In my case I needed the as-deployed Xml filename to be fixed and yet I wanted it to be possible
to provide any filename at all to be provided as the source. Here we are defining the fixed,
as-deployed filename. -->
<AsDeployedXmlFilename>MyServiceStorageConfig.xml</AsDeployedXmlFilename>
<!-- Wire our own AddFilesToProjectDeployment target into the GetCopyToOutputDirectoryItems
target. That target is evaluated not only as part of normal .csproj evaluation, but also as part
of .ccproj evaluation. It is how the .ccproj manages to interrogate your dll producing projects
about all of the project files that need to be packaged. -->
<GetCopyToOutputDirectoryItemsDependsOn>
AddFilesToProjectDeployment;
$(GetCopyToOutputDirectoryItemsDependsOn)
</GetCopyToOutputDirectoryItemsDependsOn>
</PropertyGroup>
<Target Name="AddFilesToProjectDeployment">
<Error Condition="!Exists('#(SpecialXmlFileItem)')"
Text="The all important and very special XML file is not found: %(SpecialXmlFileItem.ItemSpec)" />
<ItemGroup>
<ContentWithTargetPath Include="#(SpecialXmlFileItem->'%(FullPath)')">
<!-- In my case I wanted to deploy my xml file right next to my .dll, so I included no relative
path information in the below value of TargetPath, just the simple filename. But, I think if you
included relative path information in the below value that it would be preserved in the deployment. -->
<TargetPath>$(AsDeployedXmlFilename)</TargetPath>
<CopyToOutputDirectory>Always</CopyToOutputDirectory>
</ContentWithTargetPath>
</ItemGroup>
</Target>
-Bern McCarty

Answer 2

I think this is just a question of timing... make sure the files get combined, minified, and placed into build before the publishing (packaging) step happens.
Sorry I don't have more details; I've never tried to do this sort of thing.