We are building a Xamarin forms app and every time any of the developers check in code it seems there are always changes being made to the Android Resources.designer.cs file. What is it that controls the automatic updates to that file? What do I need to stabilize in our dev environments across our developer machines to prevent that from aways getting different updates?
You can safely add the file to .gitignore , in Xamarin sample repo, they have the resource.designer file in gitignore too, https://github.com/xamarin/xamarin-forms-samples/blob/master/.gitignore
Another alternative is to add AndroidUseIntermediateDesignerFile inside PropertyGroup in your android csproj and then remove Resource.designer.cs, that way Resource.designer.cs will be generated inside obj folder
Example:
<PropertyGroup>
<AndroidUseIntermediateDesignerFile>True</AndroidUseIntermediateDesignerFile>
</PropertyGroup>
I've found adding the file to git's "unchanged index" can be helpful. But that puts the onus on each developer to add the resource designer file to their unchanged list in their own environment. Any alternative might be to write a "repo clone script" that does it when the repo is cloned.
git update-index --assume-unchanged Resource.Designer.cs
Here is a link to another Stack Overflow question along the same lines:
Resource.Designer.cs under git
Related
in the new asp.net 5 template there's a project.json in which you can exclude certain directories.
"exclude": [
"wwwroot",
"node_modules",
"bower_components",
"dist",
".tmp"
]
As you can see, I added a few folders like 'dist' and '.tmp', but they are still included in the solution explorer. There's not much documentation about this. How to exculde files/folders from your project in vs 2015?
The "exclude" property does not hide the folder from visual studio, it will not make the folder "disappear" from the solution explorer.
The "exclude" property removes the folder from the compilation search path. It is an instruction to the compiler (Roslyn) not the IDE. As a more comprehensive answer "project.json" is intentionally IDE agnostic. That is why there is both a projecname.xspoj and a project.json which both contain project configuration information. This is necessary to allow for more robust cross IDE and cross platform development.
You can verify this behavior yourself with a simple excercise.
Add a new class file (buildfail.cs) to your existing project (or
create a new project) in the root project folder.
Ensure buildfail.cs has the same namespace as the other source files in the
project, contains compilation errors, and is in the root directory.
You should see build errors in VS. If you don't manually build.
Create a new folder (excludeme) off the project root and move
buildfail.cs to that folder. You should still have build errors.
Add excludeme to the exclude property in project.json. The build errors should be removed because builfail.cs is no longer in the build search path.
You may be wondering what is VS using to know to hide the node_packages folder from the Solution Explorer display. I am unsure and it may not be user configurable but it isn' the exclude property. Comment out node_packages in project.json and you will get build errors (package restore failure) but the folder will still be hidden from Solution Explorer. Since this is IDE specific behavior one would assume that maybe it is defined in projectname.xproj but I found no such property so at this time it would appear to be black box magic by VS.
As of Asp.Net 5 beta-8 and complementary tooling update to Visual Studio 2015, you are now able to exclude/hide folders from being displayed in solution explorer. More information about this, and other changes are outlined in the announcement post. To hide a file or folder, right-click to bring up a context menu and select Hide from solution explorer. This creates an entry in the .xproj file:
<ItemGroup>
<DnxInvisibleContent Include="myhiddenfile.txt" />
</ItemGroup>
Note also that there has been a change to where bower packages are installed by default. Previously, the Asp.Net 5 templates in Visual Studio would install bower packages to a folder called bower_components, a practice familiar to web developers who do not use Visual Studio. However, apparently due to developer confusion, this has been changed to wwwroot/lib. This can be changed by editing the bowerrc file. As such, the bower_components folder does not exist in the new beta-8 templates. Please see this post by Scott Hanselman for more information.
It may not be ideal, but I was able to hide a folder from the solution explorer in an Asp.net 5 project by marking the folder as hidden in the windows explorer properties dialog. I had the .idea folder used by WebStorm showing up so it being hidden was not too big a deal. WebStorm doesn't mind.
It seems like the folder will not be hidden if it is already in the solution explorer. Mark it and it's contents hidden and move it temporarily out of the project folder. Make sure it disappears from the solution explorer before moving it back. It should not show back up. A restart of Visual Studio may also work, I didn't test that.
Rightly or wrongly, here's what I did to get bower_components and .sass-cache out of the way. In my case, node_modules was already excluded from my project somehow, even though it's at the same level with gruntfile.js. I still don't understand why it is treated differently. Anyone know?
First, I set my location like this in the .bowerrc file:
{
"directory": "../../artifacts/bower_components"
}
Then I adjusted my paths as necessary in my gruntfile.js
Also, To get the sass-cache folder out of the way, since I was using grunt-contrib-compass, I configured my compass task with this option:
cacheDir: '../../artifacts/.sass-cache',
There are other ways to do this if you are using other sass / compass tools.
RESULT:
I can now search my entire project for text and not get hits in my libraries.
bower_components and .sass-cache are out of reach of source control.
With the latest Visual Studio you just need to right-click the folder/file and chose "Hide from Solution Explorer".
That will change the "xproj" this way:
<ItemGroup>
<DnxInvisibleFolder Include="wwwroot\" />
</ItemGroup>
Looking at the state of asp.net 5 with visual studio 2015 I can only say that they made it much more difficult and inconvenient to work with task runners like gulp or grunt. Since I'm using Web API 2 to manage my data I switched to Visual Studio Code with bower, gulp and browsersync and this has proven a to be LOT easier and faster with much less clutter.
To make a startup template: https://github.com/Swiip/generator-gulp-angular
Now you can use any editor and you get a clear separation of front end and back end development. Plus you get to know gulp and bower and the (minimal) command line stuff which VS2015 tries to do for you (and fails to do so many times).
Oh yes: you don't have to exclude folders anymore, since the template has a much more sensible folder structure
I've run into this issue when trying to publish my application today that I have published many times before. I'm trying to publish to a directory.
The issue I have is, if I go to my app directory C:\www\clients\clientsite\app\clientproject\Properties\PublishProfiles where the error below says it can't find the file I can clearly see the git.pubxml file.
Copying file Properties\PublishProfiles\git.pubxml to obj\Release\Package\PackageTmp\Properties\PublishProfiles\git.pubxml failed. Could not find file 'Properties\PublishProfiles\git.pubxml'.
I've checked directory security settings and those are proper. I tried deleting my bin and obj but nothing is making a difference.
Often times the solution here is to edit the project file itself in notepad.
The trick to finding the afflicted path is to inspect the OUTPUT window, not the ERROR LIST window.
Once you find the afflicted file path, search for it in the project file and remove the reference.
In most cases the troublesome lines in the project file look like :
<Content include="{your path}" />
Continue to remove the includes until publishing works.
IMPORTANT: if you keep Visual Studio open while you're doing this, you must accept the "reload all" prompt.
I just ran into this after removing all unversioned files from my filesystem (which caused some .pubxml.user files to be lost.
If you right click the project node and click "publish", then select the publish profile that is causing problems, then simply close the publish dialog, Visual Studio will ask if you want to save changes... when you click yes, it regenerate the .pubxml.user file and everything works again.
Have you ensured that the file actually exists in the project? I have had problems working in a team where some file I wrote ended up not appearing in VS as a project file, so when we published, it didn't exist in the publish. If you can't find it inside VS, ensure that you are not debugging, and drop the file into the project file structure, then publish as normal.
VS was saying it couldn't find that file because the git.pubxml file in that directory was of type USER File and it needed to be PUBXML. When I added the correct file type from another version of that same project, I was able to publish the project again. I believe the PUBXML file was removed by mistake in source control.
It usually happens to binary files after updating it. Some packages remove it's own .xml and .pubxml files, while visual studio still believes that it is a part of the project.
What you need to do it to check for a Yellow Triangle besides the file name in the project directory tree, and remove that files, they're useless since your project compiles without errors.
try changing the publishing settings. if you check "Precompile during publishing" this will recreate your .pubxml.user file
I looked in Solution Explorer under the PublishProfiles section and found that the file was excluded and had a "!" by it showing a warning that the file wasn't found. I deleted it, then went into my Publish settings to edit a profile. I changed something (for me to compile files during publish.) Then I tried republishing the solution, and it worked!
Using a Visual Studio 2010 ASP.net web application, I have several projects that share some JavaScript/css files. The most logical way for them to share these files is to place the files in a single folder and each project has them included with the "Add as Link" option. However, if I add the files this way when I'm debugging using either the Visual Studio Development server or debugging using a local IIS web server all requests for these files return 404 Not Found errors. If I publish the site then the files are copied but that obviously doesn't help with debugging.
Is there something I'm missing or is this a failing on VS's part?
To overcome this problem some time ago I created a 'MSBuild.WebApplication.CopyContentLinkedFiles' nuget package. This package adds MsBuild target which copies all content files added as link to project folder during build.
Note: if you use source control then it is better to add copied files (from Web Application folder) to ignore list.
I wouldn't really call that a failing, since you asked for that behavior in the first place: linked items in Visual Studio projects are actual links to external files. Those files can reside anywhere on the disk and are not copied into the project folder.
You might want to copy those files locally yourself during a pre-build event. That way, the files will remain synchronized and you won't duplicate them until your first compile.
The problem seems to be that the website runs right from your source folders, rather than from the bin folder. This means that the file will be missing, whether or not it is copied to the output folder.
It's probable that running from a local or remote web server would not have this problem, though I didn't get that working, and I'd rather not add IIS to my local machine if I don't have to.
Adding a pre-build copy command did work. Note that the current directory will be the bin folder. (You can use cd to echo the current directory to the build window if you want to see it):
If the file is in another solution, your command will look something like (three ..s: one to get out of each of bin, project, and solution folders):
copy ..\..\..\OtherSolution\OtherProject\Scripts\MyJSFile.js ..\Scripts\
If it's in the same solution, but a different project:
copy ..\..\OtherProject\Scripts\MyJSFile.js ..\Scripts
One minor issue is that the link to the file will collide with the new copy of the file, even if you don't add it to your project. As long as you make the link first, it seems to work. If you copied the file first, you'll have to manually delete the copy, and then refresh the solution explorer before before being able to add the link.
Select the link in Solution Explorer and then look at properties window and set Copy To Output Directory to Copy Always. Linked items are set to Do Not Copy by default.
BTW, you can copy many files as links very easily directly from Solution Explorer when using VSCommands 2010 extension.
See this blog post about a simple addition to your project file.
http://mattperdeck.com/post/Copying-linked-content-files-at-each-build-using-MSBuild.aspx
I am currently attempting to use Visual Studio 2010 'Publish' and MSDeploy functionality to handle my web deployment needs but have run into a roadblock with regards to customizing the package depending on my build configuration.
I develop in a 32bit environment but need to create a release package for a 64bit environment, so in the 'Release' configuration I have a post build event that copies the 64bit version of a third-party dll into the bin directory overwriting the 32bit version. When I use the 'Publish' functionality, even though the correct 64bit dll is being copied to the bin directory, it doesn't get included in the package.
Is there a way to get the 'Publish' to include files that have been copied into the bin directory during a post build event?
I answered a similar but different question at How do you include additional files using VS2010 web deployment packages?.
In your scenario you are using post build event, I would recommend dropping the post build event and implement your actions using your own MSBuild targets instead of post build event. Below you'll find the text of the other answer.
From: How do you include additional files using VS2010 web deployment packages?
Great question. I just posted a very detailed blog entry about this at Web Deployment Tool (MSDeploy) : Build Package including extra files or excluding specific files.
Here is the synopsis. After including files, I show how to exclude files as well.
Including Extra Files
Including extra files into the package is a bit harder but still no bigee if you are comfortable with MSBuild, and if you are not then read this. In order to do this we need to hook into the part of the process that collects the files for packaging. The target we need to extend is called CopyAllFilesToSingleFolder. This target has a dependency property, PipelinePreDeployCopyAllFilesToOneFolderDependsOn, that we can tap into and inject our own target. So we will create a target named CustomCollectFiles and inject that into the process. We achieve this with the following (remember after the import statement).
<PropertyGroup>
<CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn>
CustomCollectFiles;
$(CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn);
</CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn>
</PropertyGroup>
This will add our target to the process, now we need to define the target itself. Let’s assume that you have a folder named Extra Files that sits 1 level above your web project. You want to include all of those files. Here is the CustomCollectFiles target and we discuss after that.
<Target Name="CustomCollectFiles">
<ItemGroup>
<_CustomFiles Include="..\Extra Files\**\*" />
<FilesForPackagingFromProject Include="%(_CustomFiles.Identity)">
<DestinationRelativePath>Extra Files\%(RecursiveDir)%(Filename)%(Extension)</DestinationRelativePath>
</FilesForPackagingFromProject>
</ItemGroup>
</Target>
Here what I did was create the item _CustomFiles and in the Include attribute told it to pick up all the files in that folder and any folder underneath it. Then I use this item to populate the FilesForPackagingFromProject item. This is the item that MSDeploy actually uses to add extra files. Also notice that I declared the metadata DestinationRelativePath value. This will determine the relative path that it will be placed in the package. I used the statement Extra Files%(RecursiveDir)%(Filename)%(Extension) here. What that is saying is to place it in the same relative location in the package as it is under the Extra Files folder.
Excluding files
If you open the project file of a web application created with VS 2010 towards the bottom of it you will find a line with.
<Import Project="$(MSBuildExtensionsPath32)\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v10.0\WebApplications\Microsoft.WebApplication.targets" />
BTW you can open the project file inside of VS. Right click on the project pick Unload Project. Then right click on the unloaded project and select Edit Project.
This statement will include all the targets and tasks that we need. Most of our customizations should be after that import, if you are not sure put if after! So if you have files to exclude there is an item name, ExcludeFromPackageFiles, that can be used to do so. For example let’s say that you have file named Sample.Debug.js which included in your web application but you want that file to be excluded from the created packages. You can place the snippet below after that import statement.
<ItemGroup>
<ExcludeFromPackageFiles Include="Sample.Debug.xml">
<FromTarget>Project</FromTarget>
</ExcludeFromPackageFiles>
</ItemGroup>
By declaring populating this item the files will automatically be excluded. Note the usage of the FromTarget metadata here. I will not get into that here, but you should know to always specify that.
I found a workaround for the problem by using the ExcludeFilesFromDeployment element within the project file. I got the idea from Web Deployment: Excluding Files and Folders
So if you need to package project files as they exist in your project directory after a successful build and associated post build steps then do the following.
Edit "Package/Publish Web" project settings and
select Items to deploy to be "All files in this project folder"
Unload the project
Right click on the unloaded project and select to edit the project config
Locate the PropertyGroup element associated to the configuration setting e.g. "Release"
Within the PropertyGroup element add in the following elements and exclude files and folders you don't want in the package
<ExcludeFilesFromDeployment>*.cs;**\.svn\**\*.*;Web.*.config;*.csproj*</ExcludeFilesFromDeployment>
<ExcludeFoldersFromDeployment>.svn;Controllers;BootstrapperTasks;Properties</ExcludeFoldersFromDeployment>
Save and reload your project
This solves my problem for the time being but if there is a better solution then please let me know, as this is not ideal due to the hackery involved, but then again perhaps this is an uncommon deployment scenario?
Select your files or folders and Change Build action as Content from Properties Window.
I know its a old question but none of these worked for me .
In 2017 VS I just right clicked on the extra folder to be published and select publish it worked.
Example:
Adding the bin folder (and it's contents) to the project caused the files to be copied to the publish output directory.
For me, my issue was that I needed to place a proprietary software license file in the bin/ folder, but did not want to copy it manually each deployment.
This was using Visual Studio 2015 Professional
I know this is an old conversation but I came upon it while trying to do the same thing and I thought it would be helpful to add what I found here.
Nearly all the articles about including extra files in your publication use this method of adding the CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn or CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForMSDeployDependsOn items in the PropertyGroup and they all same something like "I added this to the end of the file ..."
This is what I did and spent an afternoon trying to find why nothing was happening until I realised there was already a PropertyGroup section at the top of the file. When I put my CopyAllFilesToSingleFolderForPackageDependsOn into that section it worked fine.
Hope this saves someone time some day
I'm using git to track a project I'm developing in Flash Builder, and I'm wondering the best way to go about having it track it, especially regarding Flash Builder generated files, Compiler generated files, and source files that aren't necessarily flex files.
I had it set up to ignore all of the flash builder .project & debugging directories via .gitignore:
.actionScriptProperties
.flexProperties
.metadata
.project
.settings
bin-debug
and also treating any swf/swc files as binaries via .gitattributes
*.swf -crlf -diff -merge
*.swc -crlf -diff -merge
One issue with this setup is checking out this project and using
it in Flash Builder from scratch:
Flash Builder doesn't like it when
you have a project folder without
the .project files. Only way to
import the source into Flash Builder is to:
Create a new Flex Application
Smother the template files it
created (specifially APP_NAME.mxml)
with a git clone.
Where do I put libraries? From a git perspective, I'd like to have them in the lib folder of the repo so when someone clones the repo, everything just works, but from a local file system perspective I'd like to store all my libraries in a single location and use Flash Builder to reference them, as I may update the library or download a later version. Maybe I should put the libraries in their own repo and load them as a git module? This way I don't need to manually remember to update my Y library files in all X projects that are using them, edit: they will simply update when I update each projects' submodules.
And what about external swfs/flex modules? I've was sticking external swf files in the bin-debug folder for now so the SWFLoader class can find them, but because I'm .gitignoring the bin-debug folder, they don't come with the repo when it's cloned.
One final issue is where to keep the files for the server. Do I have them in a separate repo? I'm using php VOs' with AMFPHP so it's good to be able to edit the php files alongside my actionscript files in Flash Builder... but they don't belong in the project src folder.
The current solution I'm using is:
Creating a 'server' folder in the project root
Pointing an apache virtualhost at it
Setting the run/debug settings to http://APP_NAME.localhost
Then using the server folder as a replacement for bin-debug when the files get exported
The problem with this is I've got a big mess of compiler generated files, and non-AS source files in my server folder. It just doesn't seem like an elegant solution.
How do you set up git to work with flash builder smoothly? Could all this be resolved with multiple git repos/Flash Builder projects, or an ANT script or something?
Thanks.
I've found a good solution which avoids all of the horror of having untracked files and keeping a massive .ignore list:
CLEAN your projects before you git commit.
Simple as that.
Whether it be by Flash Builder or by ant, you should have the ability to clean anyway, so if you simply clean before you commit, the problem of generated files is solved. Duh.
In fact you could probably set it up as a git hook or something.
Typically for eclipse projects with any SCM, I initially check in everything including .projects, etc., but maybe except bin-debug in your case. Then just make sure that anybody who checks out the project never checks back in those .xxx files. For instance, when I use perforce, I first check out the .xxx files to a changelist that I never check in. Then check out the rest to a separate changelist.
Another tip is to use user defined library variables when working with build paths, etc.