Is there xbuild /t:Package support? (TravisCI)

Question

(somewhat related issue)

TravisCI supports C# builds and Elastic Beanstalk deployments. Cool. But I can't get the Package target to build my zip file that gets deployed into EBS IIS.

My .travis.yml file looks like:

language: csharp
solution: RestfulWCFService.sln
mono:
  - latest
script:
  - xbuild RestfulWCFService.sln /p:Configuration=Release /p:Platform="Any CPU" ## OK
  - xbuild RestfulWCFService.csproj /t:Package /p:Configuration=Release ## FAIL!
deploy:
  - provider: elasticbeanstalk
  ....

mono version:

$ mono --version
Mono JIT compiler version 4.0.1 (tarball Thu May 28 09:08:28 UTC 2015)

The (OK) build message is:

...
Done executing task "CallTarget"
Done building target "Build" in project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.sln".
Done building target "Build" in project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.sln" ("/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.sln").
Done building project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.sln".

Build succeeded.

Warnings:

/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.sln (default targets) ->
(Build target) ->
/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj (default targets) ->
/usr/lib/mono/4.5/Microsoft.Common.targets (ResolveAssemblyReferences target) ->

        /usr/lib/mono/4.5/Microsoft.Common.targets:  warning : Reference 'System.Web.Entity' not resolved

         1 Warning(s)
         0 Error(s)

The (FAIL) /t:Package message looks like:

...
/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj: Importing project /usr/lib/mono/xbuild/Microsoft/VisualStudio/v10.0/WebApplications/Microsoft.WebApplication.targets from extension path /usr/lib/mono/xbuild
Building target "_ValidateEssentialProperties" in project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj" ("/usr/lib/mono/4.5/Microsoft.Common.targets").
Done building target "_ValidateEssentialProperties" in project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj" ("/usr/lib/mono/4.5/Microsoft.Common.targets").
/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj: error : Target named 'Package' not found in the project.
Done building project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj".-- FAILED

Build FAILED.
Errors:

/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj (Package) ->

        /home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj: error : Target named 'Package' not found in the project.

         0 Warning(s)
         1 Error(s)

So my question is, why Target named 'Package' not found in the project? I've verified /t:Package works fine with MSBuild on a Windows machine.

Note: I've found that if I add an empty target into the .csproj file like

[Target Name="Package"\]
[/Target]

It no longer complains about a missing target, but does nothing:

...
/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj: Importing project /usr/lib/mono/xbuild/Microsoft/VisualStudio/v10.0/WebApplications/Microsoft.WebApplication.targets from extension path /usr/lib/mono/xbuild
Building target "_ValidateEssentialProperties" in project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj" ("/usr/lib/mono/4.5/Microsoft.Common.targets").
Done building target "_ValidateEssentialProperties" in project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj" ("/usr/lib/mono/4.5/Microsoft.Common.targets").
Building target "Package" in project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj" ("/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj").
Done building target "Package" in project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj" ("/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj").
Done building project "/home/vagrant/syllabus/RestfulWCFService.csproj".

Build succeeded.
         0 Warning(s)
         0 Error(s)

Any xbuild help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

So my question is, why Target named 'Package' not found in the project? I've verified /t:Package works fine with MSBuild on a Windows machine.

xBuild not a 100% replacement for MSBuild. MSBuild has now been open sourced and work is being done to get is to play nice in an xplat world, but it is not there yet...

So when xbuild complains about the Package target missing from your project, that is because it is not defined in the targets that are available 'out of the box' for xbuild. It very well might be written as a platform dependent dll that MSBuild loads/executes and there was not public information on what they were doing and thus is never got any focus at Xamarin, and/or not enough people needed that feature. Plus /t:package creates files like "myApp.deploy.cmd" that would not work on *nix....

So you are on the right track, add a Package target to your project and define the tasks that you need it to do to emulate what the built-in Web packaging infrastructure Package is doing on Windows, but in a xplat env. I would assuming some message, Path combines, exec and copy tasks to create/move the zip file. If you really need the "myApp.SetParameters.xml" file, you could task that also.

xbuild v12 predefined Targets in "Microsoft.Common.targets"

Target Name="_ValidateEssentialProperties"
Target Name="PrepareForBuild" DependsOnTargets="$(PrepareForBuildDependsOn)"
Target Name="AssignLinkMetadata"
Target Name="GetFrameworkPaths"
Target Name="GetReferenceAssemblyPaths" DependsOnTargets="$(GetReferenceAssemblyPathsDependsOn)"
Target Name="GenerateTargetFrameworkMonikerAttribute"
Target Name="ResolveReferences" DependsOnTargets="$(ResolveReferencesDependsOn)"
Target Name="BeforeResolveReferences"
Target Name="AfterResolveReferences"
Target Name="ResolveAssemblyReferences" DependsOnTargets="$(ResolveAssemblyReferencesDependsOn)"
Target Name="SplitProjectReferencesByExistent"
Target Name="_ComputeNonExistentFileProperty"
Target Name="BuildOnlySettings"
Target Name="BeforeBuild"
Target Name="AfterBuild"
Target Name="Build" DependsOnTargets="$(BuildDependsOn)" Outputs="$(TargetPath)"
Target Name="BeforeCompile"
Target Name="AfterCompile"
Target Name="Compile" DependsOnTargets="$(CompileDependsOn)"
Target Name="PrepareForRun" DependsOnTargets="$(PrepareForRunDependsOn)"
Target Name="PrepareResources" DependsOnTargets="$(PrepareResourcesDependsOn)"
Target Name="SplitResourcesByCulture" DependsOnTargets="AssignTargetPaths"
Target Name="GenerateSatelliteAssemblies"
Target Name="DeployOutputFiles"
Target Name="_CopyDeployFilesToOutputDirectory"
Target Name="_CopyDeployFilesToOutputDirectoryPreserveNewest"
Target Name="_CopyDeployFilesToOutputDirectoryAlways"
Target Name="_CopyAppConfigFile" Condition="'@(AppConfigWithTargetPath)' != ''"
Target Name="GetTargetPath" Outputs="$(TargetPath)"
Target Name="GetCopyToOutputDirectoryItems"
Target Name="PreBuildEvent"
Target Name="PostBuildEvent"
Target Name="_TimestampBeforeCompile" Condition="'$(RunPostBuildEvent)' == 'OnOutputUpdated'"
Target Name="_TimestampAfterCompile" Condition="'$(RunPostBuildEvent)' == 'OnOutputUpdated'"
Target Name="BeforeRebuild"
Target Name="AfterRebuild"
Target Name="Rebuild"
Target Name="_RecordCleanFile"
Target Name="_GetCompileOutputsForClean"
Target Name="_GetCleanFileWrites"
Target Name="CleanReferencedProjects"
Target Name="Clean" DependsOnTargets="$(CleanDependsOn)"
Target Name="BeforeClean"
Target Name="AfterClean"
Target Name="CoreClean" DependsOnTargets="_GetCleanFileWrites"
Target Name="ImplicitlyExpandDesignTimeFacades"

xbuild Tasks (define in v12 / Microsoft.Build.Tasks.*) :

Microsoft.Build.Tasks.AL"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.AssignTargetPath"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.AssignLinkMetadata"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.AssignCulture"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.AssignProjectConfiguration"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.CallTarget"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.CombinePath"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.Copy"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.CreateCSharpManifestResourceName"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.CreateVisualBasicManifestResourceName"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.CreateItem"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.CreateProperty"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.Csc"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.Delete"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.Error"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.Exec"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.FindAppConfigFile"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.FindUnderPath"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.GenerateResource"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.GetAssemblyIdentity"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.GetFrameworkPath"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.GetFrameworkSdkPath"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.GetReferenceAssemblyPaths"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.LC"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.MakeDir"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.Message"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.MSBuild"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.ReadLinesFromFile"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.RemoveDir"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.RemoveDuplicates"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.ResolveAssemblyReference"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.SignFile"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.Touch"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.Vbc"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.Warning"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.WriteCodeFragment"
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.WriteLinesToFile"