How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Giorgio Galante — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 22:54:49 GMT

How about spending $80 of that $100 on an MSBuild UI editor ala FinalBuilder. I don't bother using MSBuild for anything beyond the project/solution compilation tasks.

Personally, XML is too verbose and annoying to deal with, when there are plenty of better tools out there to achieve the same goals.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

BinaryCoder — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 22:56:08 GMT

$35 (#7) Inline tasks: with built-in support for C# and VB

$25 (#8) Typing and scoping for items and properties

$25 (#5) Extensible up-to-date checking

$15 (#9) Extensible functions: with ability to define these using inline scripts like (#7)

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Mike Ward — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 23:05:50 GMT

$30 (#7) - Inline tasks

$20 (#3) - Deployment/MSI

$20 (#4) - Conversion of .sln

$20 (#1) - Multiprocessor

$10 (#11) - Debugger

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Fabio Vazquez — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 23:53:12 GMT

$50 (#11) - Debugger

$50 (#12) - Visualization

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Kjell-Åke Andersson — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 00:09:17 GMT

#2 - $5

#3 - $30

#4 - $30

#11 - $15

#12 - $20

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Bert Huijben — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 02:04:14 GMT

$20 (#1) Multicore speedup

$25 (#2) VC Projects

$ 5 (#4) Solutions

$30 (#7) Internal tasks

$ 5 (#9) Internal functions

$15 (#12) Build visualization

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

John Hall — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 02:09:20 GMT

$90 (#2) VC support

$10 (#5) Extensible up-to-date checking

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Li Yang — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 05:14:45 GMT

$50 (#11) - Debugger

$50 (#12) - Visualization

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Mitch Wagner — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 07:12:38 GMT

$50 [#11] - Debugger

$25 [#12] - Visualization

$10 [#9] - built in functions

$10 [#8] - Typing and scoping

$5 [#7] - extensible reusable inline tasks

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

john — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 13:36:02 GMT

In that order.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

David Parrish — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 16:25:19 GMT

$30 (6) Distributed Build

$20 (8) Typing and scoping

$20 (11) MSBuild debugger

$10 (2) VC support

$10 (3) Support for .vdproj

$10 (4) Conversion of .sln

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Veksi — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 17:26:57 GMT

#2 VC support

#1 Higher performance multiprocessor support

#4 Conversion of Visual Studio solution files

And then better debug and visualisation support

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Scott Weinstein — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 21:13:19 GMT

$35 - #5 - extensible uptodate check

$35 - #12 dependenency visualization - wpf please

$5 - #4 .sln files are so lame

$0 - #3 this should be the responsibility of those project teams. On our project - if somthing requires an IDE to build, it's not viable tech for us.

$25 - #1

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

buckh — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 22:34:51 GMT

Here's my take. Making the experience of developing, maintaining, and debugging msbuild scripts would be hugely valuable.

12 - visualization - $30

11 - msbuild debugger - $25

?? - visual editor, navigation (e.g., jump to target or property, symbolic search, navigation) - $20

3 - support for non-msbuild projects - this is extremely important, but as Scott says, it's the other teams that need to do the work

2 - vc support - $20

9 - extensible functions - $5

Buck

How would you prioritize features for MSBuild?

Buck Hodges — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 22:36:36 GMT

Dan Moseley, a developer on the MSBuild team , wants to know how you would prioritize features for the

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

JuzC — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 22:58:56 GMT

$70 Supporting other project types (espec. .vdproj)

$30 Interface and built in functionality for manually and automatically modifying assembly versions (and setup proj versions) with each build.

How would you prioritize features for MSBuild?

Noticias externas — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 23:29:34 GMT

Dan Moseley, a developer on the MSBuild team , wants to know how you would prioritize features for the

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

James Geall — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 00:18:43 GMT

#1 1$

#4 20$

#3 79$, sort of.

Would you consider making the internal SolutionParser(name from memory) class (it creates an msbuild proj file in memory that represents the solution) extensible so that when it finds a project it doesn't recognise it raises an event or looks at some plugins to parse said project and create build tasks for it? That may make it easier for your teams to pickup internally and allow people outside microsoft to develop support for project types important to them.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Grant Holliday — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 00:44:59 GMT

$40 - #3 Other Project types

$40 - #4 Conversion of .sln files to MSBuild

$10 - #12 Visualization for project and target dependencies

$5 - #5 Debugger

$5 - #6 Distributed build

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

GertGregers — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 00:51:56 GMT

#11 - $60

#12 - $25

#3 - $15

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

John Bennett — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 01:03:58 GMT

1) Multiprocessor support: $15

3) Project types:

- $30 for Deployment/MSI projects

- $5 for Sql Reporting projects

4) .sln files: $5

7) Extensible reusable inline tasks: $20

11) Debugger: $25

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Maor David — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 01:37:26 GMT

#12 - visualization - $30

#1 - msbuild debugger - $25

#2 - vc support - $20

#9 - extensible functions - $5

#7 - Inline tasks - $20

How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Maor David — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 01:39:53 GMT

Dan Moseley, a developer on the MSBuild team , wants to know how you would prioritize features for the

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Justin-Josef Angel [MVP] — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 01:41:00 GMT

#1 - 10$

#2 - 0$

#3 - 0$ (nice to have, tons of work for nothing)

#4 - 5$ (nice to have, Abbot time we have it)

#5 - 0$

#6 - 10$

#7 - 10$ (Demo driven feature)

#8 - 0$

#9 - 10$

#11 - 50$

#12 - 25$

Debugging - 50$

Visualization - 25$

Multiprocessor & Multi machine build - 20$

SLN - 5$

The two most needed features in terms of development is the things that allready exists elsewhere - Debugging & Drag and drop development cycle.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Eugenez — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 02:38:03 GMT

#1 $15

#2 $20

#3 $5

#4 $25

#5 $0

#6 $5

#7 $5

#8 $0

#9 $10

#11 $10

#12 $5

To me the most important feature is having all VS projects/solutions work with MSBuild. Performance related features (will be useful for Team Build) come after that.

All other things are useful - but only once the above two are implemented.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Sayed Ibrahim Hashimi — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 09:35:10 GMT

4 - $45

6 - $10

7 - $10

11 - $30

12 - $10

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Carel Lotz — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 10:45:06 GMT

#7 - $10

#9 - $30

#11 - $50

#12 - $10

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Ali — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 11:19:42 GMT

#2 $30

#4 $30

#6 $20

#12 $20

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Dennis — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 11:33:01 GMT

$100 Make it easier to set the Version at build time instead of having to edit AssemblyInfo files.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Stephane Tombeur — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 12:05:05 GMT

#2 (VC) $20

#4 (SLN) $30

#7 (inline tasks) $10

#8 (prop scoping) $10

#11 (debugging) $30

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Rudenko Sergey — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 12:47:08 GMT

#2 (.vcproj) 10$

#3 (.vdproj) 45$

(.rptproj),(.prproj) 10$

# 6 (distributed build) 5$

#11 (debugging) 20$

#12 (visualization) 10%

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Martin MacPherson — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 12:48:04 GMT

$55 (#11) - Debugger

$30 (#12) - Visualization

$10 (#6) - Distributed Build

$5 (#8) - Typed and scoped properties..

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

kingbing — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 13:04:35 GMT

Currently, to build an editor, I'd need to parse and understand the file myself, rather than use the object model (I'm thinking in particular that there's no way to enumerate the metadata associated with elements). My $100 would go entirely to allowing me to fully access an arbitrary .proj file from the object model.

This way anyone could build an editor (including yourselves, but hey, I know how busy you are, and I've only got a measly 100 bucks to spend...)

Cheers

Matt

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Johan Andersson — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 13:17:18 GMT

$33 - (Not in list) "Framework support" for writing unit test fixtures for task libraries

$33 - 4) Conversion of Visual Studio solution files

$33 - 7) Extensible reuseable inline tasks

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Dirk Rombauts — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 15:52:35 GMT

3) $30

4) $15

7) (with C#, VB, PowerShell) $25

9) $5

13) full object-model support, which opens the way for unit tests: $25

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

acorcoran — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 16:09:08 GMT

Visualization - $60

Debugger - $30

Lunch with Build Team - $10

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

jbramwell — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 16:37:20 GMT

$50 - (11) Debugger (this would be an awesome addition!)

$30 - (7) Extensible inline tasks - I could see this feature getting huge use (and re-use)

$15 - (3) Support for other project types

$5 - (8) Typing/scoping

How Would You Spend $100 On MSBuild?

Aaron Hallberg — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 16:54:38 GMT

The MSBuild team is looking for some feedback from the community to keep their "vision" for the next

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Steve Nuchia — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 17:17:03 GMT

remove the distinctions between the IDE's build system and MSBUILD; eliminate all "special" project formats.

Get with the 3rd party tool vendors and make their compilers work with MSBUILD!!!!!!!!

then add a debugger. (Actually, add the debugger early since it will help with evangelism)

#2: $25

#3: $10

#4: $25

#11: 25

#12: 15

Once I can actually use msbuild to do my builds it might become interesting to think about performance and syntax improvements.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Markus Schiller — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 17:39:36 GMT

Give $100 for number 4, the Visual Studio SLNs. This is a conceptual break which hurts in TeamBuild alot! Even the 30 year old make (happy birthday make http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Make_%28software%29#Origin) does a better job here.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Chris Lively — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 17:46:09 GMT

$40: MSBuild UI. Use the Visual Studio platform and make a decent UI for this.

$50: #3. Anything the IDE can build, MSBuild should be able to handle.

$10: Get rid of the ellipses in the build log files. Sometimes trying to track down exactly which file msbuild is complaining about is difficult. It's a log file, who cares how long the path is.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

josh — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 19:58:07 GMT

11 (Debugger): $40. Yes please, complex build scripts can be a PITA to get right.

4 (Solutions to MSBuild): $20, I hate having to choose between solutions and buildfiles.

8 (Typing/scoping): $20, it's a little jarring the first time you realize this doesn't work. Would be nice.

9 (Extensible Functions): $10

7 (Inline Tasks): $10, both of these would help make build customization easier.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Anthony — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 20:48:33 GMT

As a newbie, debugging a MSBuild script is definitely the most time-consuming part.

So that's #11

#4 might feed into the MSBuild-from-MSBuild scripts that I've seen used. It would probably make this easier. MSBuild-from-MSBuild is OK, so long as you're aware that no environment is passed across unless it's specified explicitly (see time taken to debug...).

#3 has already been done for installers, it's called Wix 3. Please do it for Sandcastle docs. Doing it for others too looks reasonable, not that I have suffered personally from the lack.

The rest look a bit more esoteric - get the basics right first. If you want MSBuild to be more like a programming language, why not just make MSBuild a class (or set of classes) usable from powershell scripts? That's a good programming wheel, don't reinvent it badly with ugly XMl syntax, global vars and include files everywhere.

I would spend:

#3: $20

#4: $40

#11: $40

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Ken — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 20:51:18 GMT

$50 on #11 Debugger

$30 on #9 Extensible Functions

$20 on #1 Higher performance multiprocessor support

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Dylan Smith — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 20:52:42 GMT

$20 - [3] Support for other project types

$30 - [4] Conversion of sln to MSBuild

$50 - [?] Full-Fledged GUI interface to create and maintain MSBuild scripts

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

John Robbins — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 21:16:08 GMT

Debugger - $50

VC support - $25

Visualization - $25

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Rick Glos — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 21:39:07 GMT

3) 50% Support for other Microsoft project types... - we're using WiX, would be nice to swap it out and maybe this might put some pressure on making installers a better toolset in the VS Package

12) 40% Visualization for project and target dependencies... This would be nice.

4) 10% Conversion of Visual Studio solution files... If just for the sake of clarity in switching between non-xml .sln and xml .*proj files

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Ran Davidovitz — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 21:49:07 GMT

40$ - 3) Support for other Microsoft project types.

30$ - 4) Conversion of Visual Studio solution files.

20$ - 7) Extensible reuseable inline tasks.

5$ - 9) Extensible functions.

5$ - Visualization for project and target dependencies.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Tom A — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 23:03:39 GMT

I think it is very important at this late stage to get the other groups to get with it and move to the MSBuild format. I can't believe that even in VS 2008 the vdproj files are not MSBuild and thus can't build from a pure MSBuild command-line. We had to go to WiX to avoid devenv.exe builds. A true IDE like Visual Build Pro would be awesome, but their tool is so inexpensive already that it probably isn't worth Microsoft's time to duplicate it.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Patrick — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 00:58:11 GMT

$ 50 Distribute Processing

$ 50 Load Balancing Builds and Scheduled Builds Across a Farm

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

msbuild — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 01:04:06 GMT

@Steve

>> Get with the 3rd party tool vendors and make their compilers work with MSBUILD!!!!!!!!

We need your help advocating this to those vendors. But a few months ago, Borland's released their latest IDE and it now uses MSBuild for builds of native code.

Dan

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Keith Hill — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 03:27:36 GMT

$25 on #7 - Oh man, PowerShell in msbuild would rock my world!

$25 on #11 - msbuild debugger

$20 on #3 - support deployment projects

$15 on #4 - convert SLN format to msbuild

$10 on #2 - support VC projects directly

$5 on #9 - extensible functions

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Cleve Littlefield — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 04:36:24 GMT

$50 - Debugger

$25 - Converting to all MSBuild solution system, 2, 3, 4

$25 - Deployment support for Test, Pre-Production, and production environments (with log on what was applied, and when). Should run appropriate test suite after deployment (full suite in test, smoke test in production).

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Joshua Flanagan — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 05:08:05 GMT

#3 $10

#4 $20

#5 $30

#9 $40

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Gavin Greig — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 14:04:19 GMT

1. Multiprocessor support: $5

2. VC support: $20

3. Other project types: $20

4. Solution files: $10

5. Up-to-date checking: $5

6. Distributed build: $5

7. Inline tasks: $2

8. Type & scope: $3

9. Extensible functions: $5

11. Debugger: $20

12. Analysis: $5

All worthwhile, but 2, 3 and 4 (making MSBuild all-inclusive) should be the top priority. BTW, please ask them to migrate .vdproj to WiX. The debugger (11) is a killer feature, so next most important. The other features are nice to have (*very* nice in some cases - those analysis features made me drool a bit), but much less important.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Jeff Hunsaker — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 22:25:36 GMT

#3 (BizTalk, etc.) -- $80

#4 (.sln) -- $15

#12 (visual) -- $5

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Roland K — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 22:44:41 GMT

#3 (Biztalk) -- $80

#6 (Distributed Build) -- $15

Coffee -- $5

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Shawn W — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 23:45:56 GMT

#4 - 50%, do it fast and good, sln files must go away as they don't scale and overly complacate large tree builds that have non-trivial dependancy graphs.

#2,3 - 40%, These two items are the same thing get all the *proj files to just work, do it good

#7 - 10%, do it cheap, while this functionality has a high value for some, more often than not inline code will just make the build files harder to maintain for the majority of builders.

The rest would benefit from having the above list completed first.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Justin — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 08:15:36 GMT

$50: VDPROJ (Deployment/MSI) project support

$30: VC project support

$20: SLN support

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Austin Donnelly — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 14:07:37 GMT

$50 on #1: faster multiprocessor builds

$25 on #7: inline tasks

$25 on #11: debugger

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

FreeToDev — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 14:14:26 GMT

1) $5

3) $40

6) $10

7) $15

9) $15

11) $10

12) $5

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Klaus RM — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 14:48:58 GMT

2) $40

4) $40

1) $10

12) $10

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

AC [MVP MOSS] — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 01:30:09 GMT

#4 - $25

#7 - $30

#11 - $35

#12 - $10

And if I can issue myself a $50 mail in rebate form, I'll toss in another $25 for #11, $15 for #7 and $10 for #4.

+ a big THANK YOU for asking for customer feedback! I'll even mail in my $50.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Steve St Jean — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 02:17:52 GMT

#1 Higher perf - $50

#4 Convert .sln - $15

#2 VC Support - $15

#11 Debugger - $10

#12 Visualizers - $10

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Jim McGregor — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 11:30:47 GMT

#11 Debugger $75

#12 Visualisation $20

#7 Inline reusable tasks $5

Izindaba #19

From the software development trenches — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 08:08:45 GMT

Time for another weekly round-up of developer news that focuses on .NET, agile and general development

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Aikson — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 10:40:42 GMT

#2 VC support $70

#12 Visualisation $20

#4 Solution files: $10

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Floh — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 14:50:56 GMT

#6 Distributed Build $80

#4 Conversion of sln files $10

#11 Debugger $10

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Chris — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 17:08:08 GMT

11 - 55 bucks

12 - 20 bucks

4 - 15 bucks

One week of building a team build for 120+ VC6 / VB6 / MSBuild projects made me want those the most.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Muhammed Inam — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 23:52:24 GMT

#3 Deployment/MSI & BizTalk $80

#4 Conversion of sln files $15

#11 Debugger $5

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Ben — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 02:30:57 GMT

#11 - MSBuild debugger: $70

#12 - Visualization: $30

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Malte — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 10:59:17 GMT

#3 BizTalk $80

#4 Conversion $10

#11 Debugger $0

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Josh — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 01:49:30 GMT

#2 VC Builds: $50

#4 Solutions: $10

#6 Distributed Builds: $40

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Craig — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 08:34:42 GMT

#3 - $40

#4 - $30

#11 - $25

#12 - $ 5

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

prulifson — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 11:59:04 GMT

#6 - $50

#11 - $25

#12 - $25

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Rune — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 12:06:47 GMT

#6 - $50

#11 - $25

#12 - $25

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Morten Brun — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 12:42:48 GMT

#2 - $25

#4 - $25

#6 - $25

#12 - $25

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Sergey Popov — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 14:34:43 GMT

#1 (Multiprocessor) - $10

#2 (VC support) - $0

#3 (Support for other project types) - $0

#4 (Conversion of VS solutions) - $5

#5 (Extensible up-to-date checking) - $0

#6 (Distributed Build) - $0

#7 (Extensible reuseable inline tasks) - $30

#8 (Typing and scoping) - $15

#9 (Extensible functions) - $30

#11 (An MSBuild debugger ) - $5

#12 (Visualization) - $5

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Steve — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 00:25:23 GMT

#4 (VS Solutions) - $33

#7 (Extensibility) - $33

#11 (Debugging) - $33

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Dean ONeill — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 03:54:11 GMT

#2 $50 (VC native support is a MUST have)

#1 $25 (better multi-proc support)

#6 $25 (multi-machine support)

Our code base is in the 10s of millions of lines of C and C++ code, and our builds take hours and hours. So anything to help that along would be great! To be perfectly honest, I want every darn item in that list, eventually.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

larryd — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 18:08:50 GMT

$75 - Mulitple builds at one time on one box

$25 - more like NAnt, in otherwords programable

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

aaronhallberg — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 18:30:01 GMT

My vote would be to spend $50 on getting the full solution/project system MSBuild compliant (vcproj, other project types, solutions), $40 on the debugger, and $10 on the miscellaneous syntax improvements (typing and scoping, re-usable inline tasks, extensible functions). The other features (improved multiproc support, distributed build, project/target dependency visualization) target what I think is probably a pretty small segment of the market, though based on the other comments I may be wrong here!

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

dvanderboom — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 19:03:44 GMT

Performance, performance, performance.

$50 - #5 Extensible Up-to-date Checking.

Right now when I "build solution", it seems to spend too much time figuring out if the project has changed, and builds projects that shouldn't need to be rebuilt.

$30 - #1 Greater Multi-processor Performance

For obvious reasons.

$20 - #13 Better scheduling of tasks, even for single-processor performance

The bottleneck for MSBuild is file access, right? So when multiple projects are being built, why isn't my disk access in Resource Monitor pegged constantly? It reads for a while, then stops reading while compiling the code, then starts hitting the disk again later to write out files, etc. I imagine some kind of thread should be constantly filling the funnel and queueing up files into memory proactively so that no downstream tasks are held up. Thrash the disk like crazy and don't let any non-disk-accessing gaps appear.

Also, the use of multiple threads and concurrent builds could be useful even on single-processor machines. I'm guessing some multithreading must already be going on, but an optimization of these could probably do wonders.

Response to the feature poll

MSBuild Team Blog — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 20:18:28 GMT

There were over 80 responses to my recent post asking for feedback on where MSBuild should be heading

Response to the feature poll

Noticias externas — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 21:14:20 GMT

There were over 80 responses to my recent post asking for feedback on where MSBuild should be heading

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

abdul — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 01:26:33 GMT

$40 (#11) MSBuild debugger (especially important if you add more "cleverness" through extensible functions - which means more obscure ways of breaking a build)

$30 (#2) VC++ support

$10 (#4) SLN support

$10 (#7) Extensible inline tasks

$10 (#9) Extensible functions

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

David A. — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 22:19:20 GMT

$50: #4 - Solution file in MSBuild

$50: #9 - Extensible functions

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Jon S — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 23:14:12 GMT

11) An MSBuild debugger $50

12) Visualization $35

6) Distributed Builds $15

Debuggability tops MSBuild feature poll

Noticias externas — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 06:02:08 GMT

Dan Mosely recently posted a feature poll on the MSBuild blog . Here are the results . Debuggability

Most Wanted: Debugging For MSBuild

Maor David — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 00:25:17 GMT

I posted few weeks ago about the feature poll of MSBuild team on the MSBuild blog . Here are the results

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Lakshmi Akkiraju — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 23:19:18 GMT

#11 - $30

#7 - $30

#12 - $20

#6 - $5

#4, #2, #3 - $15

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Ion Singh — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 02:36:26 GMT

$90 #3 setup projects

$10: #4

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

AndyW — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 06:46:38 GMT

From an enterprise perspective #3 is probably worth $110.

There are three main scenarios.

a) Packaging programmer code (deployment project using application project output)

b) Packaging 3rd party product/legacy application (thats not packaged) where they just provide a zip file full of files and directories.

c) Re-Packaging 3rd party product that has already been packaged (such as applying additonal transforms).

a) and b) really need automating. VStudio is flawed in that the file-open dialog used to select the files to be packaged, does not handle directory selection (so each directory has to be manually added, then individual files).

It would be good to have an automated process where I can assign a package script to a directory have have it automatically package any files/folders/sub-folders that are dropped into that directory. Perhaps the result of a build or a 3rd party supplying a new zip file etc.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

msbuild — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 01:10:19 GMT

@AndyW

Thanks for this detail -- I've passed it on to the team that owns deployment projects.

I think they're getting the message, everybody wants MSBuild based deployment projects.

Dan

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Jeff Gullett — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 22:11:31 GMT

$80 # 9: I would like to be able to see if a certain symbol was defined within the project build options using the /define:VarName argument, so I can conditionally reference that file.

$15 #11: MSBuild Debugger

$ 5 # 4: Convert .sln -> MSBuild

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Ian Jorgensen — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 00:56:04 GMT

$ 40 (4) Msbuild sln

$ 40 (11) Debugger

$ 10 (9) Extensible functions

$ 10 (7) Extensible reuseable inline tasks

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Burton — Fri, 28 Dec 2007 18:46:56 GMT

#2 $75 VC Support Shoulda happened in VS05

#3 $20 DEPLOYMENT!!! (.vdproj would be nice, but WIX or other "full featured" would be AWESOME)

#8 $5

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Pete — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 21:45:43 GMT

$80 (4) Convert .sln file

$20 (3) Other project types

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Alex — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 21:51:21 GMT

#2 $70 VC Support (VS2005 including)

#3 $30 Support for other Microsoft project types

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Richard Nagle — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 16:49:13 GMT

#4 $100

But rather than a converter I'd like to see VS replace .sln files with MS-Build files. Probably just a pipe-dream but I think this would have huge benefits for anyone with a more than basic configuration.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Kevin Rose — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 03:30:38 GMT

6. $50

7. $20

11.$10

12.$20

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Nicolas Gauvin — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 20:49:06 GMT

#2(VC Support): $40

#4(Sln Support): $40

#1(Higher perf multiproc): $20

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Adam Lacey — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 19:54:30 GMT

#4 - $100

MUST replace solution files -- how do you build multiple projects using one MSBuild script?

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

msbuild — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 20:01:03 GMT

@Adam Lacey

> how do you build multiple projects using one MSBuild script?

Hi Adam, could you clarify what you mean? MSBuild can already build solution files. Also some people create "traversal projects" that simply run MSBuild on a list of projects. These could even be nested. I take your point that this is definitely not ideal, because VS cannot open such things yet.

Dan

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Jason Spicer — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 03:23:54 GMT

#1 - $20

#2 - $20

#3 - $20

#4 - $20

#12 - $20

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

SpiderM9 — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 06:28:57 GMT

#2 - $20

#4 - $30

#5 - $50

Xoreax will figure out #6, and it will only cost me about $100.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Victor Sergienko — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 16:01:57 GMT

#9 - 70

#6, #8, #11 - $10 each

And another $100 of mine for GenerateBootstrapper to:

$20 - to fix "MSI not found after .NET installation reboot"

$30 - to make .NET installation launchable from a bootstrapper launched from another MSI;

$45 - to make setup.exe a SFX archive that contains my MSI inside.

$5 - to make ReadLinesFromFile not trim them.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Daniel R — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 12:49:08 GMT

#3 - 50$

#4 - 30$

#1 - 10$

#12 - 5$

#11 - 5$

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

mikeycooper — Sat, 03 May 2008 06:51:49 GMT

Late to the party, I know, but if #4 also provides some kind of support akin to solutions embedded into other solutions, $100. One of the most frustrating parts of n-tier development with VS solutions for me has been having to add a newly referenced project by something low down in the stack (say a framework project now depends on a new framework-crypto project) to EVERY solution that uses the framework project. Having Visual Studio somehow manage project inclusion would be dreamy.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Anonymous — Tue, 06 May 2008 16:19:17 GMT

I have a problem with msbuild on VC++ Win32 solution. When I run the msbuild on that solution file, it builds and the ide opens immediately with that solution file. Why is it so? Also, one of the dependency proj was missing. Is it because of that?

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Duncan Handley — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 15:01:45 GMT

It has to be

#2 - $33

#3 - $33

#4 - $33

everything else - $1

You have to make msbuild a standard before you do anything else with it. I work for a very large multi-national company, and we have applications written in many languages, particularly C. I wanted to standardise us on MSBuild for all our Microsoft related apps, but because you don't use msbuild for VC project files, or any solution files I may have to recommend we use something else.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

frank — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 01:14:55 GMT

$100 dollars for .vdproj support. without this it is just another useless tool that can not complete the job needed

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Bu Hai-Qing — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 02:42:58 GMT

$50 (#11) - Debugger

$50 (#12) - Visualization

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Richard Winks — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 23:24:55 GMT

#4 - $40

#2 - $40

#3 - $20

Top priority, get all solution/project/build related files into consistent / extensible format.

Path length limit 248/260 characters

NTR — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 17:51:54 GMT

What about fixing something that everybody at some point encounters. The use of absolute paths and the related maximum characters error. This is a constant annoyance for us, since we try to honor .NET naming guidelines and try to give products real names instead of acronyms or similar. And windows does support paths longer than 256 so why this limit?

The error: Typically with $(FullName) something:

The specified path, file name, or both are too long. The fully qualified file name must be less than 260 characters, and the directory name must be less than 248 characters.

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

AYoG — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 20:27:30 GMT

$40 - #9: Extensible functions

$60 - #11: Debugger

re: How would you spend $100 on MSBuild?

Fabrizio Benedetti — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 19:55:21 GMT

$80 on #2 (.vcproj migration)

$20 on a Visual Editor (I am evaluating SideKick, but without .vcproj migration to MSBuild it's of little use)