Getting started

OneBuild is a modular set of convention based .NET solution build scripts written in PowerShell, relying on Invoke-Build for task automation. See https://github.com/lholman/OneBuild for more details.

Building with OneBuild

OneBuild is shipped as a solution NuGet package, use it to build your solution by installing the NuGet package..

PS>Install-Package OneBuild

Then simply run..

C:\>cd "Path to your solution"
C:\Path to your solution\>OneBuild.bat

NuGet installs OneBuild and its dependencies in your $SolutionDir\Packages folder, copying the OneBuild.bat bootstrap script to the root of the $SolutionDir

How OneBuild works

OneBuild is a modular set of .NET solution build scripts written in PowerShell. Following the proven Deployment Pipeline approach to software build and delivery, OneBuild makes the Commit phase (versioning, compilation, unit testing and packaging of binaries) of a Deployment Pipeline a repeatable, deterministic and simple exercise. Being convention based and therefore requiring no configuration allows OneBuild to build any target .NET solution out of the box, assuming the solution follows some basic convention patterns. OneBuild is proud to rely on Invoke-Build for task automation.

Options

Using standard Powershell and Invoke-Build script parameters you can pass in values for the following.

• -task - Optional. The name of the Invoke-Build task to execute, defaults to Invoke-Commit.
• -configuration - Optional. The .NET build configuration, Debug or Release, defaults to Debug.
• -buildcounter - Optional. The incrementing build counter often used within CI servers, generally forming the third part of a four part version number ([major].[minor].[buildCounter].[revision]), defaults to 999.

The build pipeline and convention

Much of the logic within each phase of the build pipeline relies heavily on convention, thus no configuration. Adhere to the documented convention and OneBuild should just work.

Note: The OneBuild OneBuild.bat bootstrap script and Invoke-Build OneBuild.build.ps1 build script must sit alongside the Visual Studio solution file(s) you intend to build. If you install with NuGet these are copied for you when executing PM> Install-Package Nunit

Early assumptions

• You use Git for version control (TFS and Subversion support in the backlog)
• The 3 part Semantic Versioning style is used for all NuGet package versioning. For Git repos a global commit count (4th part) and the short commit Id (informational text) are added to the assembly versions.
• You use NUnit for unit testing (Support for other testing frameworks coming)
• You want to use NuGet for packaging up your assemblies

Why OneBuild?

There are a number of benefits of having a build process that can be run in its entirety on a local (developers) machine. I've written more about this before, but here's a summary.

• Fail earlier. Catch more failed builds earlier on by changing fewer variables, i.e. don’t compile and build in a completely different way on your Continuous Integration (CI) server than your developers do on their development machines.
• Own a debuggable build process. Building software is tricky, let me (or anyone) debug that process locally, so we don’t have to constantly break the CI builds to see things fail.
• Make the build process a first class citizen. Yes, let’s put the build process under version control and treat it as code, I care about changes and versions… A LOT. Not to mention I want an easy way to clone that build process in to as many application branches as I want, without fudging configuration.
• Improve quality. If we treat the build process as code then we can also test it as part of its own pipeline: See our Pester unit tests here
  
• Decouple yourself from the CI server vendor. I love TeamCity, have a long running tempestuous relationship with Team Foundation Server (TFS), have had a few flings with Jenkins and chatted up the likes of AppVeyor and various other CI and build server products. The one thing they all have in common is they give you an inch, but allow you to take a mile. It is incredibly easy to use their "simple" out-the-box, add-on tasks, runners and plug-ins, however this means it is almost impossible to move to another CI server technology or run a build in its entirety locally.