How to Publish Web with msbuild?

Visual Studio 2010 has a Publish command that allows you to publish your Web Application Project to a file system location. I'd like to do this on my TeamCity build server, so I need to do it with the solution runner or msbuild. I tried using the Publish target, but I think that might be for ClickOnce:

msbuild Project.csproj /t:Publish /p:Configuration=Deploy

I basically want to do exactly what a web deployment project does, but without the add-in. I need it to compile the WAP, remove any files unnecessary for execution, perform any web.config transformations, and copy the output to a specified location.

My Solution, based on Jeff Siver's answer

<Target Name="Deploy">
    <MSBuild Projects="$(SolutionFile)" 
             Properties="Configuration=$(Configuration);DeployOnBuild=true;DeployTarget=Package" 
             ContinueOnError="false" />
    <Exec Command="&quot;$(ProjectPath)\obj\$(Configuration)\Package\$(ProjectName).deploy.cmd&quot; /y /m:$(DeployServer) -enableRule:DoNotDeleteRule" 
          ContinueOnError="false" />
</Target>

I got it mostly working without a custom msbuild script. Here are the relevant TeamCity build configuration settings:

Artifact paths: %system.teamcity.build.workingDir%\MyProject\obj\Debug\Package\PackageTmp
Type of runner: MSBuild (Runner for MSBuild files)
Build file path: MyProject\MyProject.csproj
Working directory: same as checkout directory
MSBuild version: Microsoft .NET Framework 4.0
MSBuild ToolsVersion: 4.0
Run platform: x86
Targets: Package
Command line parameters to MSBuild.exe: /p:Configuration=Debug

This will compile, package (with web.config transformation), and save the output as artifacts. The only thing missing is copying the output to a specified location, but that could be done either in another TeamCity build configuration with an artifact dependency or with an msbuild script.

Update

Here is an msbuild script that will compile, package (with web.config transformation), and copy the output to my staging server

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<Project DefaultTargets="Build" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">
    <PropertyGroup>
        <Configuration Condition=" '$(Configuration)' == '' ">Release</Configuration>
        <SolutionName>MySolution</SolutionName>
        <SolutionFile>$(SolutionName).sln</SolutionFile>
        <ProjectName>MyProject</ProjectName>
        <ProjectFile>$(ProjectName)\$(ProjectName).csproj</ProjectFile>
    </PropertyGroup>

    <Target Name="Build" DependsOnTargets="BuildPackage;CopyOutput" />
    
    <Target Name="BuildPackage">
        <MSBuild Projects="$(SolutionFile)" ContinueOnError="false" Targets="Rebuild" Properties="Configuration=$(Configuration)" />
        <MSBuild Projects="$(ProjectFile)" ContinueOnError="false" Targets="Package" Properties="Configuration=$(Configuration)" />
    </Target>

    <Target Name="CopyOutput">
        <ItemGroup>
            <PackagedFiles Include="$(ProjectName)\obj\$(Configuration)\Package\PackageTmp\**\*.*"/>
        </ItemGroup>
        <Copy SourceFiles="@(PackagedFiles)" DestinationFiles="@(PackagedFiles->'\\build02\wwwroot\$(ProjectName)\$(Configuration)\%(RecursiveDir)%(Filename)%(Extension)')"/>
    </Target>
</Project>

You can also remove the SolutionName and ProjectName properties from the PropertyGroup tag and pass them to msbuild.

msbuild build.xml /p:Configuration=Deploy;SolutionName=MySolution;ProjectName=MyProject

Update 2

Since this question still gets a good deal of traffic, I thought it was worth updating my answer with my current script that uses Web Deploy (also known as MSDeploy).

<Project xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003" DefaultTargets="Build" ToolsVersion="4.0">
  <PropertyGroup>
    <Configuration Condition=" '$(Configuration)' == '' ">Release</Configuration>
    <ProjectFile Condition=" '$(ProjectFile)' == '' ">$(ProjectName)\$(ProjectName).csproj</ProjectFile>
    <DeployServiceUrl Condition=" '$(DeployServiceUrl)' == '' ">http://staging-server/MSDeployAgentService</DeployServiceUrl>
  </PropertyGroup>

  <Target Name="VerifyProperties">
    <!-- Verify that we have values for all required properties -->
    <Error Condition=" '$(ProjectName)' == '' " Text="ProjectName is required." />
  </Target>

  <Target Name="Build" DependsOnTargets="VerifyProperties">
    <!-- Deploy using windows authentication -->
    <MSBuild Projects="$(ProjectFile)"
             Properties="Configuration=$(Configuration);
                             MvcBuildViews=False;
                             DeployOnBuild=true;
                             DeployTarget=MSDeployPublish;
                             CreatePackageOnPublish=True;
                             AllowUntrustedCertificate=True;
                             MSDeployPublishMethod=RemoteAgent;
                             MsDeployServiceUrl=$(DeployServiceUrl);
                             SkipExtraFilesOnServer=True;
                             UserName=;
                             Password=;"
             ContinueOnError="false" />
  </Target>
</Project>

In TeamCity, I have parameters named env.Configuration, env.ProjectName and env.DeployServiceUrl. The MSBuild runner has the build file path and the parameters are passed automagically (you don't have to specify them in Command line parameters).

You can also run it from the command line:

msbuild build.xml /p:Configuration=Staging;ProjectName=MyProject;DeployServiceUrl=http://staging-server/MSDeployAgentService

Using the deployment profiles introduced in VS 2012, you can publish with the following command line:

msbuild MyProject.csproj /p:DeployOnBuild=true /p:PublishProfile=<profile-name> /p:Password=<insert-password> /p:VisualStudioVersion=11.0

For more information on the parameters see this.

The values for the /p:VisualStudioVersion parameter depend on your version of Visual Studio. Wikipedia has a table of Visual Studio releases and their versions.

I came up with such solution, works great for me:

msbuild /t:ResolveReferences;_WPPCopyWebApplication /p:BuildingProject=true;OutDir=C:\Temp\build\ Test.csproj

The secret sauce is _WPPCopyWebApplication target.

I don't know TeamCity so I hope this can work for you.

The best way I've found to do this is with MSDeploy.exe. This is part of the WebDeploy project run by Microsoft. You can download the bits here.

With WebDeploy, you run the command line

msdeploy.exe -verb:sync -source:contentPath=c:\webApp -dest:contentPath=c:\DeployedWebApp

This does the same thing as the VS Publish command, copying only the necessary bits to the deployment folder.

With VisualStudio 2012 there is a way to handle subj without publish profiles. You can pass output folder using parameters. It works both with absolute and relative path in 'publishUrl' parameter. You can use VS100COMNTOOLS, however you need to override VisualStudioVersion to use target 'WebPublish' from %ProgramFiles%\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v11.0\WebApplications\Microsoft.WebApplication.targets. With VisualStudioVersion 10.0 this script will succeed with no outputs :)

Update: I've managed to use this method on a build server with just Windows SDK 7.1 installed (no Visual Studio 2010 and 2012 on a machine). But I had to follow these steps to make it work:

1. Make Windows SDK 7.1 current on a machine using Simmo answer (https://stackoverflow.com/a/2907056/2164198)
2. Setting Registry Key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\SxS\VS7\10.0 to "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0" (use your path as appropriate)
3. Copying folder %ProgramFiles%\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v11.0 from my developer machine to build server

Script:

set WORK_DIR=%~dp0
pushd %WORK_DIR%
set OUTPUTS=%WORK_DIR%..\Outputs
set CONFIG=%~1
if "%CONFIG%"=="" set CONFIG=Release
set VSTOOLS="%VS100COMNTOOLS%"
if %VSTOOLS%=="" set "PATH=%PATH%;%WINDIR%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319" && goto skipvsinit
call "%VSTOOLS:~1,-1%vsvars32.bat"
if errorlevel 1 goto end
:skipvsinit
msbuild.exe Project.csproj /t:WebPublish /p:Configuration=%CONFIG% /p:VisualStudioVersion=11.0 /p:WebPublishMethod=FileSystem /p:publishUrl=%OUTPUTS%\Project
if errorlevel 1 goto end
:end
popd
exit /b %ERRORLEVEL%

found two different solutions which worked in slightly different way:

1. This solution is inspired by the answer from alexanderb https://stackoverflow.com/a/6764639/2066007">[link]</a>;. Unfortunately it did not work for us - some dll's were not copied to the OutDir. We found out that replacing ResolveReferences with Build target solves the problem - now all necessary files are copied into the OutDir location.

msbuild /target:Build;_WPPCopyWebApplication  /p:Configuration=Release;OutDir=C:\Tmp\myApp\ MyApp.csproj

Disadvantage of this solution was the fact that OutDir contained not only files for publish.

2. The first solution works well but not as we expected. We wanted to have the publish functionality as it is in Visual Studio IDE - i.e. only the files which should be published will be copied into the Output directory. As it has been already mentioned first solution copies much more files into the OutDir - the website for publish is then stored in _PublishedWebsites/{ProjectName} subfolder. The following command solves this - only the files for publish will be copied to desired folder. So now you have directory which can be directly published - in comparison with the first solution you will save some space on hard drive.

msbuild /target:Build;PipelinePreDeployCopyAllFilesToOneFolder /p:Configuration=Release;_PackageTempDir=C:\Tmp\myApp;AutoParameterizationWebConfigConnectionStrings=false MyApp.csproj

AutoParameterizationWebConfigConnectionStrings=false parameter will guarantee that connection strings will not be handled as special artifacts and will be correctly generated - for more information see https://stackoverflow.com/a/4151829">link</a>;.

You must set your environments

• < WebSite name>
• < domain>

and reference my blog.(sorry post was Korean)

• http://xyz37.blog.me/50124665657

• http://blog.naver.com/PostSearchList.nhn?SearchText=webdeploy&blogId=xyz37&x=25&y=7

    @ECHO OFF
    :: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5598668/valid-parameters-for-msdeploy-via-msbuild
    ::-DeployOnBuild -True
    :: -False
    :: 
    ::-DeployTarget -MsDeployPublish
    :: -Package
    :: 
    ::-Configuration -Name of a valid solution configuration
    :: 
    ::-CreatePackageOnPublish -True
    :: -False
    :: 
    ::-DeployIisAppPath -<Web Site Name>/<Folder>
    :: 
    ::-MsDeployServiceUrl -Location of MSDeploy installation you want to use
    :: 
    ::-MsDeployPublishMethod -WMSVC (Web Management Service)
    :: -RemoteAgent
    :: 
    ::-AllowUntrustedCertificate (used with self-signed SSL certificates) -True
    :: -False
    :: 
    ::-UserName
    ::-Password
    SETLOCAL
    
    IF EXIST "%SystemRoot%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727" SET FXPath="%SystemRoot%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727"
    IF EXIST "%SystemRoot%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v3.5" SET FXPath="%SystemRoot%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v3.5"
    IF EXIST "%SystemRoot%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319" SET FXPath="%SystemRoot%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319"
    
    SET targetFile=<web site fullPath ie. .\trunk\WebServer\WebServer.csproj
    SET configuration=Release
    SET msDeployServiceUrl=https://<domain>:8172/MsDeploy.axd
    SET msDeploySite="<WebSite name>"
    SET userName="WebDeploy"
    SET password=%USERNAME%
    SET platform=AnyCPU
    SET msbuild=%FXPath%\MSBuild.exe /MaxCpuCount:%NUMBER_OF_PROCESSORS% /clp:ShowCommandLine
    
    %MSBuild% %targetFile% /p:configuration=%configuration%;Platform=%platform% /p:DeployOnBuild=True /p:DeployTarget=MsDeployPublish /p:CreatePackageOnPublish=False /p:DeployIISAppPath=%msDeploySite% /p:MSDeployPublishMethod=WMSVC /p:MsDeployServiceUrl=%msDeployServiceUrl% /p:AllowUntrustedCertificate=True /p:UserName=%USERNAME% /p:Password=%password% /p:SkipExtraFilesOnServer=True /p:VisualStudioVersion=12.0
    
    IF NOT "%ERRORLEVEL%"=="0" PAUSE 
    ENDLOCAL
  

this is my working batch

publish-my-website.bat

SET MSBUILD_PATH="C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2017\Enterprise\MSBuild\15.0\Bin"
SET PUBLISH_DIRECTORY="C:\MyWebsitePublished"
SET PROJECT="D:\Github\MyWebSite.csproj"


cd /d %MSBUILD_PATH%
MSBuild %PROJECT%  /p:DeployOnBuild=True /p:DeployDefaultTarget=WebPublish /p:WebPublishMethod=FileSystem /p:DeleteExistingFiles=True /p:publishUrl=%PUBLISH_DIRECTORY%

Note that I installed Visual Studio on server to be able to run MsBuild.exe because the MsBuild.exe in .Net Framework folders don't work.

You can Publish the Solution with desired path by below code, Here PublishInDFolder is the name that has the path where we need to publish(we need to create this in below pic)

You can create publish file like this

Add below 2 lines of code in batch file(.bat)

@echo OFF 
call "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2017\Enterprise\Common7\Tools\VsMSBuildCmd.bat"
MSBuild.exe  D:\\Solution\\DataLink.sln /p:DeployOnBuild=true /p:PublishProfile=PublishInDFolder
pause

This my batch file

C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\MSBuild.exe C:\Projects\testPublish\testPublish.csproj  /p:DeployOnBuild=true /property:Configuration=Release
if exist "C:\PublishDirectory" rd /q /s "C:\PublishDirectory"
C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\aspnet_compiler.exe -v / -p C:\Projects\testPublish\obj\Release\Package\PackageTmp -c C:\PublishDirectory
cd C:\PublishDirectory\bin 
del *.xml
del *.pdb

For generating the publish output provide one more parameter. msbuild example.sln /p:publishprofile=profilename /p:deployonbuild=true /p:configuration=debug/or any

you can use this command to publish web applications with Publish Profiles.

msbuild SolutionName.sln /p:DeployOnBuild=true /p:PublishProfile=PublishProfileName

This sample Publish Profile can create a release zip file with a version number that's in AssemblyInfo.cs File in the network path (create zip file and remove other published files with PowerShell command is optional).

 <Project ToolsVersion="4.0" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">
     <PropertyGroup>
    <WebPublishMethod>FileSystem</WebPublishMethod>
    <LastUsedBuildConfiguration>Release</LastUsedBuildConfiguration>
    <LastUsedPlatform>Any CPU</LastUsedPlatform>
    <SiteUrlToLaunchAfterPublish />
    <LaunchSiteAfterPublish>True</LaunchSiteAfterPublish>
    <ExcludeApp_Data>False</ExcludeApp_Data>
    <Major>0</Major>
    <Minor>1</Minor>
    <Build>2</Build>
    <Publish>C:\</Publish>
    <publishUrl>$(Publish)</publishUrl>
    <DeleteExistingFiles>True</DeleteExistingFiles>
  </PropertyGroup>
  <Target Name="GetBuildUrl">
    <PropertyGroup>      <In>$([System.IO.File]::ReadAllText('$(MSBuildProjectDirectory)\Properties\AssemblyInfo.cs'))</In>
      <TargetPath>\\NetworkPath\ProjectName</TargetPath>
      <Pattern>^\s*\[assembly: AssemblyVersion\(\D*(\d+)\.(\d+)\.(\d+)\.(\d+)</Pattern>
      <Major>$([System.Text.RegularExpressions.Regex]::Match($(In), $(Pattern), System.Text.RegularExpressions.RegexOptions.Multiline).Groups[1].Value)</Major>
      <Minor>$([System.Text.RegularExpressions.Regex]::Match($(In), $(Pattern), System.Text.RegularExpressions.RegexOptions.Multiline).Groups[2].Value)</Minor>
      <Build>$([System.Text.RegularExpressions.Regex]::Match($(In), $(Pattern), System.Text.RegularExpressions.RegexOptions.Multiline).Groups[3].Value)</Build>
      <Sub>$([System.Text.RegularExpressions.Regex]::Match($(In), $(Pattern), System.Text.RegularExpressions.RegexOptions.Multiline).Groups[4].Value)</Sub>
      <Publish>$(TargetPath)\$(Major).$(Minor).$(Build).$(Sub)\</Publish>
      <publishUrl Condition=" '$(Publish)' != '' ">$(Publish)</publishUrl>
      <publishUrl Condition=" '$(Publish)' == '' and '$(LastUsedBuildConfiguration)'!='' ">$(LastUsedBuildConfiguration)</publishUrl>
    </PropertyGroup>
  </Target>
  <Target Name="BeforeBuild" DependsOnTargets="GetBuildUrl">
    <Message Importance="High" Text="|" />
    <Message Importance="High" Text=" ================================================================================================" />
    <Message Importance="High" Text="    BUILD INFO                                                                                    " />
    <Message Importance="High" Text="    Version [$(Major).$(Minor).$(Build)] found in [$(MSBuildProjectDirectory)\Properties\AssemblyInfo.cs] " />
    <Message Importance="High" Text="    Build will be saved to [$(publishUrl)]                                                        " />
    <Message Importance="High" Text=" =================================================================================================" />
    <Message Importance="High" Text="|" />
  </Target>
  <Target Name="Zip" BeforeTargets="AfterBuild">
    <Exec Command="PowerShell -command Compress-Archive -Path $(Publish) -DestinationPath $(Publish)Release.zip" />
    <Exec Command="PowerShell -command Remove-Item -Recurse -Force $(Publish) -Exclude Release.zip" />
  </Target>
</Project>