Starting a Build
With one or more builds defined, team members can initiate any of them at any time by manually invoking them from the Team Explorer window or by scheduling them for an automatic start.
Scheduling Builds
Team Foundation Build does not natively support the capability to schedule builds for one-off or recurring execution. However, by using a TFS command from the command line, you can use the standard window scheduler task scheduler.
To schedule a build, you need to have the following pieces of information handy:
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The URL to the Team Foundation application tier server
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The name of the team project that contains the build type
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The name of the build type that you want to schedule
The TFS command for executing and controlling builds is TFSBuild.exe (located in <TeamBuildInstallDir>\Common7\IDE\). If you pass in a few parameters, this executable will reach out to the indicated build server, locate the team project, and download its build configuration information. It will then execute the build.
Using Notepad or any other text editor, create a batch file (for example, a .cmd or .bat file) that runs the tfsbuild start command with the parameters in the order outlined in the preceding list.
The exact syntax looks like this:
tfsbuild start TFSApp01:8080 AdventureWorksCMMI DailyDebug
You could also pass in other parameters to override some of the settings contained within the build type such as the Build server to use and the drop location for the published build.
Note
Consult the MSDN documentation, under the topic "Team Foundation Build Commands," for a complete reference guide to all the supported command-line commands available for use with Team Foundation Build.
After you have created and saved this batch file, you can schedule its execution by using the Windows Scheduled Task Wizard. Figure 23.11 shows a task to run this build command every night at midnight.
Figure 23.11. Scheduling a build.
Invoking a Build
To invoke a build from Visual Studio, right-click on the build type in Team Explorer and select Build Team Project. As you can see from Figure 23.12, the build dialog box will provide the opportunity to select a build type and change some of the settings contained within that build type, such as the machine to use to conduct the build and the build directory on that machine.
Figure 23.12. Running a build.
After a build has been started, it will proceed through its steps until failure or success.
Figure 23.13 shows the general process that each build will follow.
Figure 23.13. The general build process.
As the build progresses through its various steps, the build engine constantly writes and logs information about its progress back to the build repository, enabling interested team members to monitor its progress at runtime from within Visual Studio.