Create programmable MSBuild Tasks

[hishamco]

@jtkech I'm thinking to introduce programmable MSBuild tasks that will be useful for various reasons, such as:

• Copy Translations files

• Cleanup files

• or anything you may think of

I knew we can do that in .csproj files, be here we can have a benefit of test ability, readability, productivity, flexibility .. etc

[jtkech]

yes good idea

[Piedone]

Can you tell about some concrete use cases in more detail? Like, what exactly would "Copy Translations files" and "Cleanup files" do?

[hishamco]

Working with MSBuild tasks is a tedious work, also a tiny typo could break everything I remembered we using programmable MSBuild tasks in SimplCommerce long time ago, this way we can easy create, modify any task

[Piedone]

Sorry, this is really vague for me. Please provide examples.

[hishamco]

For instance, copying translation files is a simple task that took days if not weeks to make work fine as it is, I remember JT works heavily to get it done.

If we have a programmatic way to create MSBuild task this should not take a day IMHO, for that JT was interested on this at that time

[Piedone]

Aren't you looking to implement custom tasks in C#?

[hishamco]

The problem is not with writing the task itself, but rather how it is getting work with OC :)

[Piedone]

And how would such programmable tasks work? Wouldn't rather custom MSBuild targets that let you hook into the build pipeline of OC serve this?

[Piedone]

So, where do you want to go with this issue and PR?

[hishamco]

Hi @Piedone as you know we are on a holy month "Ramadhan" so I don't have much time to revise the remaining PRs. I'll struggle in the upcoming two weeks

[Piedone]

I see, no worries, and have a happy Ramadan!

[hishamco]

BTW the number of PRs -especially mine - has been reduced a lot, thanks for your ZoltanGC.Collect() :)

[Piedone]

Great :D.

[hishamco]

And how would such programmable tasks work? Wouldn't rather custom MSBuild targets that let you hook into the build pipeline of OC serve this?

Implementing programmable MSBuild tasks will open up the possibilities for doing anything during the build time:

• Reduce the time for creating a build task from within .csproj, I remember JT spend a lot of PR to make copying localization translations works
• Easy to create if you know C# :)
• We can create custom targets or use the built-in once
• PERF nothing involves in the runtime
• We can move almost the stuff that we did in .csproj into readable and understandable tasks such as:
  1. Copying translation files
  2. Creating wwwroot folder
  3. Creating NuGet packages
  4. and much more

The possibilities are endless, you can do whatever you want with the MSBuild black box instead of dealing with XML

[Piedone]

What I'm probably most missing is what you mean by "programmable" (and even after checking out the PR). Since MSBuild Tasks are already, for all intents and purposes, programmable. Because you previously said that you don't mean being able to write tasks in C#.

[hishamco]

What I'm probably most missing is what you mean by "programmable"

Programmatically

Since MSBuild Tasks are already, for all intents and purposes, programmable. Because you previously said that you don't mean being able to write tasks in C#.

I can write them in .csproj but they are tedious and time-consuming and you find yourself reading the docs all the time :)

I don't mean that we need to change all that we have, at least this PoC that C# tasks are easier and do not take much time. I think this is useful for the future use cases

[Piedone]

I understand what the word "programmable" means :). I don't understand though what you mean by it in this context. So, in the end, this is actually about writing MSBuild tasks in C# (and not the MSBuild XML)?

[hishamco]

Exactly, open the possibility to write MSBuild tasks in C#, so it's easier, time-saving and testable

[Piedone]

That's something I asked about previously too, but glad we cleared it up :).