Team Foundation Server Builds

Paul Zerkel

11/21/2013

Topics of Discussion

• Overview / What is a build server?
• How TFS acts as a build server
• How to create a build
• Automating Tasks

Team Foundation Server

Microsoft’s Application Lifecycle Management solution

• Task Tracking
• Source Control
• Bug Tracking
• Build Server
• Deployments
• Lab Management
• etc

What is a Build Server?

• A service often running on a dedicated machine
• Handles running build scripts based on an event
• Often keeps track of build artifacts, retrieves dependencies, logs results, keeps statistics

Examples

• Team Foundation Server
• Jenkins
• Hudson
• Team City
• CruiseControl.net

Pros

• Centralized
• Repeatable
• Code Health Monitoring
• Continuous Integration

Cons

• Requires time to set up early on in the project.
• Another piece of infrastructure to maintain.
• Once you get used to automated builds, doing it by hand is a real pain.

Builds in TFS

Used for automated builds for code stored within Team Foundation System. Components include:

• Team Foundation Server
• Build Server
• Build Controller
• Build Agent

Small Team Infrastructure

Large Team Infrastructure

Visual Studio Online Infrastructure

Build Process Template

• TFS 2010 moved from a MSBuild based build process to a Windows Workflow based build process
• The workflows are called Build Process Templates
• Edit them like a normal workflow
• Workflows have arguments that can be customized through the build UI as part of the build definition

Build Definition

A specific instance of a build which requires:

• Name
• Status
• Trigger
• Source Settings
• Build Defaults
• Process
• Retention Policy

Built in Features

• Unit Testing
• Code Analysis
• Deployments
• Labeling

Add-on TFS Activities

Assemblies must be checked into source control and the build controller must point to the custom assembly directory.

• Build your own
• Open Source (TFS Extensions)

Versioning

• Need to download and customize the workflow
• Can set how the version number is constructed
• Lots of customization available

StyleCop

TFS Extensions has a StyleCop activity that will run stylecop on the source files and report back as part of the build process.

• Helps enforce consistent code style throughout the project
• Can be customized per project
• Violations can be set as errors

Example Project Organization

The organization of your project within TFS is imporant. The root of a project should be broken up into areas that target different stages of the software lifecycle.

• Development
• Main
• Release

Continuous Integration Example

A continuous integration build will run any time code is checked in. This gives you quick feedback on the state of the codebase.

• Set up email alerts for builds
• Create a build definition for the branch you're working in
• Pick Continuous Integration or Rolling Builds for the trigger
• Run unit tests, code analysis, and style checker
• Don't copy the output to the drop folder
• Turn off labeling

Release Example

A release build will target a branch in the Release folder. Release builds are intended to be deployed to environments outside of the developer's machines such as Development, QA, and Production.

• Create a build definition for the release branch in question
• Each build should use a TFS Version task with the Major and Minor values set
• Set the build targets appropriately
• Make sure the project has configuration transforms as needed
• Label the build
• Select a reasonable spot on the network to store build results
• Unit testing, code analysis, and style checking is optional

Questions?

Thanks!