The new <TestContainer> item in Team Build 2008 in a great way to run tests without test metadata file (*.vsmdi).

You can specify the following to run all unit tests found in assemblies matching the pattern *.Tests.dll and even specify .LoadTest and .WebTest files as well:

<ItemGroup>
  <TestContainer Include="$(Outdir)*.Tests.dll" />
  <TestContainer Include="$(Outdir)WebTest1.webtest" />
  <TestContainer Include="$(Outdir)LoadTest1.loadtest" />
</ItemGroup>

But if you try to run it in Team Build 2008, you will get an error like: Could not load file or assembly.

That’s because the task tries to do an Assembly.LoadFrom() on whatever files you include in the <TestContainer> item. This obviously fails because .LoadTest and .WebTest are XML files, not assemblies.

This problem has been solved in TFS 2008 SP1. All you need to do is to apply the TFS SP1 patch to the build machine (If you don’t want, it’s not necessary to install TFS SP1 on TF Server to get the fix).

Tags: Team Build, Team Build 2008, Team System 2008, Team System 2008 SP1

The other day I got a question: How can I deploy an app via ClickOnce using Team Build?

There is not out of box way to do that, but we can do it with a simple workaround:

we should overload the target AfterCompile in TFSBuild.Proj to call MSBuild Task Publish and can pass the PublishDir property:

<Target Name="AfterCompile">
  <MSBuild
  Condition=" '@(SolutionToBuild)'!='' "
  Projects="@(SolutionToBuild)"
  Properties="Configuration=%(ConfigurationToBuild.FlavorToBuild);
    Platform=%(ConfigurationToBuild.PlatformToBuild);
    SkipInvalidConfigurations=true;
    VCBuildOverride=$(MSBuildProjectDirectory)\TFSBuild.vsprops;
    FxCopDir=$(FxCopDir);OutDir=$(OutDir);
    PublishDir=$(OutDir);
    ReferencePath=$(ReferencePath);
    TeamBuildConstants=$(TeamBuildConstants);
    $(CodeAnalysisOption);PublishDir=\\qa1Srv\drops\publishedVers\ "
  Targets="Publish" />
</Target>

Tags: MSBuild, Team Build

The Team System Web Access team had released SP1 last week.

Some of the cool new features include:

• Ability to run multi-language in a single TSWA instance.
• 10 languages supported
• Work Item only view for users without a CAL!!
• more

Ed Hintz’s announcement to see what’s new in this release:http://blogs.msdn.com/edhintz/archive/2008/08/29/team-system-web-access-2008-sp1-power-tool.aspx

Download: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=3ECD00BA-972B-4120-A8D5-3D38311893DE

Tags: Team System 2008, Team System 2008 SP1, TSWA

Gert just posted about the release of CTP16 of the Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition GDR release.

From Gert’s post:

This release adds the following features:

• VSDBCMD.EXE
  • We added independent commandline deployment and reverse engineer, which can be used on machines that do not have Visual Studio installed, in order to deploy the results of a database project build (.dbschema file), or if you need to generate a .dbschema file so you can for example compare it, this commandline tool will let you do that as well.
• Database Project (.dbproj) Upgrades
  • CTP15 enabled upgrade of project files, but did not included updating Data Generation Plans (.DGEN files), which now be upgraded when they are opened the first time inside the DGEN designer.
• Schema Compare
  • You can now choose the SQL Command Variables (SQLCMD) to use during a Schema Compare session by clicking the “Specify SQLCMD variables” button on the Schema Compare toolbar. This will allow you to compare projects that are using SQLCMD variables and provide the contextual information via the variable values.
  • You can now set the Schema Compare options at the session level, in addition to Tools->Options, by clicking the Settings button on the Schema Compare toolbar.
  • And you can now save your Schema Compare session and reopen it again. We also added an item template for this, name “Schema Comparison”
• Extensibility
  • We finished the namespace and assembly naming cleanup. As a result all assembly names and namespaces have been changed. This means if you have code leveraging our extensibility mechanisms you need to update the assembly references and namespaces in your code.
  • We added the ability to add your own refactoring types! So now you can create your own refactoring command and have it change all the required references inside the schema. This is above and beyond the ability to create your own refactoring targets (the sources your want to change by an refactoring type), static code analysis rules, data generators, data distributions and test conditions.
  • We now also offer public access to our TSQL parsers for SQL Server 2000, 2005 and 2008, including the script generator functionality.
• And then there are many more enhancements in the parser, interpreter, validation, build and deploy.

Pre-requisites:

CTP16 requires the following components to be installed:

• Visual Studio 2008 SP1 RTM
• Microsoft SQL Server Compact Edition 3.5 SP1

Download location:

You can download CTP16 from the following location:

• http://download.microsoft.com/download/0/a/e/0ae1153a-8798-474a-93e6-d19299f37c8b/setup.exe
• http://download.microsoft.com/download/0/a/e/0ae1153a-8798-474a-93e6-d19299f37c8b/Readme.mht
• http://download.microsoft.com/download/0/a/e/0ae1153a-8798-474a-93e6-d19299f37c8b/VSTS 2008 Database Edition GDR Documentation.zip

NOTE: If you have a previous version of the GDR installed, you will have to first uninstall this and then install the latest CTP16 bits.

Tags: Team System 2008, VSTS DB Pro

Next meeting will be focused on the new features that were delivered with VSTS 2008 SP1 and the new Power Tools. We will also introduce the new testing suite (Camano) that will be shipped with the next version of TFS – Rosario.

Shahar Bracha (SRL ALM Group Manager) will talk about Visual Studio Team System Power Tools  which enables us better usage and ease when working with TFS.

During his session we will go over the new Power Tools and Service pack features  (such as: Web access enhancements, notifications support,  build, folder mapping and much more…)

For our second session Eran Ruso (SRL ALM Senior Advisor and QA Expert) we will go over Rosario in general and focus on Camano, a new standalone testing suite in Rosario.  Eran will also describe his experience as part of the first group that uses Rosario and Camano in production environments.

About the lecturers:

Shahar  is the ALM Manger at SRL Group, specializes in Microsoft technologies with an emphasis on the Team System, .NET framework and Web application architecture.

Eran  is a Senior Consultant at SRL Group, specializes in QA methodologies  and testing lifecycle.

Please register here to the event:

https://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032384162&culture=he-IL

Tags: ALM UG