DevExpress eXpressApp Framework (XAF) and Continuous Integration

Question

I have a XAF application and a nant script that runs fine on the development machines. The script uses MsBuild and the .csproj File to compile the project.

When the CruiseControl.net server tries to compile the project it states that it cannot find the XAF assemblies needed to compile.

I tried referencing all DLLs as Local Copy in the BIN folder and tried installing XAF on the development server, but it hasn't worked.

Any ideas?

Answer 1

have you tried building via msbuild directly on the server to be sure this is working correctly?

When we deployed to our CI we moved the dll´s we used to a thirdparty dll´s folder and referenced them from here. Are you 100% all of your references have been updated correctly as if you add a new module the default is to reference the dll´s in the GAC which usually doesn´t make sense.

I´d advise against installing XAF to the server as if you update the referenced folder approach is easier to manage and you can easily handle multiple branches/ versions if required.

Cheers, Crocked

Answer 2

When we run automated builds on the dev server, it took us a long time to get the exact path settings right for everything. We have builds that require VS6, VS.Net 2003, VS.Net 2005, and VS.Net 2008. Having all of those environments installed on a single build machine made for some real havoc trying to get everything to stay in their own sand-boxes.

Ultimately, using Zed Builds and Bugs we were able to keep each build step silo'd to its own sand-box with its own environment variables, and its own registry settings.

Can you get a dump of what the build-time environment looks like when the nant compile runs to see if there are missing environment variables, or incorrectly pointed environment variables?