I am currently experimenting with TFS, and I really like it.
One small question, regarding test files:
I have a directory with some demo TXT, images, dirs... These are used during tests, so up until now, the path was hardcoded to a folder on my computer. Now I need to change this, of course, the TFS need access to the files too.
My idea was to place them inside the folder of my solution, I currently have roughly this structure:
Solution Folder
mysol.sln
SomeProjectDir
OtherProjectDir
_LIB for external .dll
_DEMO_FILES for test files
The whole solution folder is under source control. Would you do it the same way? How is the best and elegant way to get the "real" path of the folder for usage in unit tests? Using the execution path an cutting away the rest? Do test files belong under source control?
Thanks for any input,
Chris
EDIT: Beside the tip given in the answer, please be aware that with testing there are some pitfalls with this. The test is executed in a different folder (often named after some timecode), the testfiles do not get copied there automatically. Even if they are set to copy always.
The solution is to either add the files manually by using a attribute called DeploymentItem in the unit-test, or, in my opinion much better, adjust the Local.testsettings and add the folder there. Keep in mind, the folder itself will not be added, so you need to do it one level higher..
You will understand what I mean if you try it. Or search for DeploymentItem on google
test files are part of your project, so there is NO reason to keep them out of the version control system. You should commit to the version control system everything that is needed to build, test and run your system, including 3rd party libraries, config files, test files, and even arguably documentation. Please note that most of these things should be part of your Visual Studio solution as well.
In my projects usually I try to have all my resources as Embedded Resource, so that I don't need to figure out the path, they are compiled into the assembly. If for some reasons I can't go this way, I would make the build copy them to the output folder (so mark them as copy always in VS) and then use relative paths.
Related
I've been messing around with some public and work Git repos (all Github), as I grow my burgeoning C# expertise...
Especially for tutorial and course repos, they use a lot of folders. I also noticed you can add a "Solution Folder". However, I've also noticed Visual Studio has this love-hate relationship with folders, and sometimes they map to the physical folder, and sometimes they... just don't.
So - what can I use them for? Is there a good use case beyond just logically grouping files in a project to organize things a bit?
Oh! And one time I opened a folder from my drive directly in Visual Studio, and it showed up just like a solution - but it was just an open folder... it was kinda weird. What's up with that?
Links to Info
This Q&A (Actual folders in Visual Solution Explorer?) explains some more about how to keep folders in a solution mapped to the physical folders, which VS is very picky about and doesn't even try to keep in sync...
If I'm understanding your question correctly, there is essentially two most common uses for folders within your solution/project.
First and probably most obvious, folders are used to organize and group together relevant files. While this is more of a personal preference thing - I often use folders to organize my code similar to that of MVC (Model View Controller).
Second and usually less common but still something to be familiar with are folders that get copied into the output directory. These folders get created when you have a file with its advanced property Copy to Output Directory set to Copy always or Copy if newer. These files then become a part of the Build Action - upon building your solution, these files get copied to the output directory. This is used when there is a need for certain files within your solution such as a data file or external resource needed to interact with.
Example: I recently worked on a project that required my solution to interact with PhantomJs, which is an external standalone executable. I needed my code to make calls and pass data to this application - thus making it a vital part of my solution. PhantomJs was placed in a folder and set to Copy if newer which ensured my copy of the executable was an available resource during runtime.
I'm writing a C# project which I want to compile both under VS2010 and VS2012. I want to have two different .csproj files for that, even though VS2010-project can be directly included in VS2012-solution. I want two different project files because of different target .NET-versions.
Additionally, I want both projects to be named the same within different solutions for VS2010 and VS2012. The both should share the same .cs-files and, possibly, some resources.
Easy task? Strange thing, but I don't know, how to do that properly.
First approach, doesn't work: name project files as MyProject10.csproj and MyProject12.csproj, leave both in the MyProject folder. But in this case they are displayed in solution as MyProject10 and MyProject12, not simply MyProject. If I rename one to MyProject in solution explorer, it automatically renames the corresponding project file.
Second approach, works, but has drawbacks. Move project files into different subdirectories, named VS10 and VS12, manually change include paths in .csproj-files, adding ..\ as a prefix. In this case I see strange shortcut-like arrows under the icons in solution explorer.
The only bad thing for the second approach is that when I add new files in the project using solution explorer, this file is placed in the VS10 subdirectory, not in the root project directory. But it seems like project directories for .csproj-files are the directories containing the file by design, and I use the dark side of the force which I really don't want to do.
Any better ideas?
Worth giving a try is changing the name of the output assembly in both projects to one and the same. The project files are still going to be different, but the output assembly will be with same name. Also be carefull where is the output directory. I think this way you can sovle your problem.
Having created a WPF/C# demo application (in Visual C# Studio Express), what are the minimum files I would need to zip up, to give the source to someone? (Not deploy an executable, but enough actual source code to recreate the project).
Obviously I need the *.xaml *.cs *.sln *.csproj files.
Do I need *.suo *.csproj.user, or are those specific to my editor?
Do I need any or all of the files in the Properties directory? Some of those files say auto-generated, which would seem to imply they're not needed.
I'd share the Properties files as well, it generally being a good idea to share and version all files that are needed to compile the project regardless of the IDE. Since it's an IDE tool that generates those files, I'd consider it bad form to leave them out, in case you want to set up a Continuous Integration server or something of that sort.
The *.suo files are Solution User Options, which kind of implies that they're per-user, not per-project. Same goes for the *.user files.
the simplest thing is to delete any obj/bin directories (if they exist), and just zip up everything else.
the .user and .suo are things that will get recreated, but there's no harm in sending them (unless they are really big!)
That being said, it really depends on the details of your project, and how you have it organized.
I'm still learning the basics of how VS2010 sees the world. Apparently, you can optionally "include" a file in a project. I'm a bit confused by this: If a file is version-controlled, AND the file is within the project directory, shouldn't it implicitly be "included" in the project? If not, what's the use case where a version-controlled file in the project directory should NOT be included in the project?
=== Addition ===
Based on the answers I've gotten so far, maybe I should rephrased my question: What does it mean for a file to be "included" in a project?
A project needs to know about files in order for compilation and distribution to occur. Just because you have a file that's under source-control, doesn't mean that it will be compiled if the project is unaware of it.
Also, you may want to include files as part of a distribution package. We do this quite often for our web projects that we distribute using web app gallery.
Conversely, you could have documentation or sql scripts that you version control, but do not want them to be part of the project.
EDIT: In answer to your update, what it means for a file to be included in a project is that the file is actually added to the .csproj or .vbproj file and will be used during compilation and/or distribution. VS does differentiate if the file is Content or if it needs to Compile it. This can be seen by clicking on the file in Solution Explorer and looking at the Build Action property.
No, you don't want random files that happen to be in the project directory included in source control.
We do sometimes put documentation (pdfs) or drawings/schematics in the project folder and under version control but you don't need them inside the visual studio project (especially when they are not being distributed because they are for internal use only).
Excluding the file from your project can be useful if the file is related to the project but not necessarily needed in the solution.
Example
If I need some test XML for an application that i'm writing; that is designed to normally be pulling this from a WCF service, it can be useful to keep that file in the directory for a development environment where I use IO to get the XML for testing, but I don't necessarily want it in my solution which is source controlled.
When you exclude a file from a project is no longer compiled or embedded, then when you want to include it again you can do so without having lost your settings.
If you e.g. copy a file (containing a helpful class which want to have in your project) into a folder of your project, then you will see ... nothing. You have to check the option "Show all files" of the solution explorer and the copied file can be seen, but it is still "greyed out". No you can choose the menuitem Include in project and that file will be integrated in your project and a pending change (add) for your source control is added too. Visual Studio doesn't include all files it can find in the project folder automatically to the project - and that is a good feature.
One of my colleagues explained to me a scenario in which a version-controlled file should NOT be part of the project. Here's the idea:
A developer writes some new code.
The code is experimental, and not intended to be part of the normal build.
The easiest way to exclude the file from the build is to NOT include it in the project, but still version-control it.
This way, the file can be shared with other developers, but not break the build.
Good day all,
I have written an application that i require to have a certain directory structure/. Nothing complex but it will need an "Images" Folder which contains two other folders "Temp" and "Complete".
These folders are in my solution however upon publishing all the folders are gone and i can not find any way in which to cause these certain folders to persist.
Will i have to write some code that checks if these exist and create them or can i make an application directory structure exist from the very beginning.
Dont know if this is relevant but i am using WPF and deploying through click-once.
Thanks,
Kohan
Regardless of whether you find a solution to the installation part of your question it would be prudent to check that the folders exist either on application start up or when you need to access them. After all, someone could come along and delete them without realising that they're needed. You might want to report or log this as an error, but recreate them anyway.
I assume you are using Visual Studio to create your ClickOnce deployments. If so, you can get around this issue by using MageUI instead.
Create your desired folder structure separate from you project's source code and bin folders. Copy in all the files you want deployed. Use MageUI and when you create the application manifest, point it to the root folder you created. It will take care of all the subfolders.
Also, I wouldn't worry too much about what ChrisF said. ClickOnce files are deployed to a very obfuscated location that users should never be in. And if they are in there deleting stuff, you'll likely have much bigger problems that a missing subfolder.