Matt, First of all thanks for your response.
msbuild's HarvestProject task isn’t appropriate for my goals for some reasons. The main is that heat doesn’t create list of all files from project’s output directory but instead add reference only to the project assembly. This is almost useless because assembly usually need some files for its work (referenced assemblies, configuration files) and has some artifacts (like readme files). Another issue I’ve faced with is that only files with specific extensions (or with specific names) should be put into .msi. Other files should be filtered out. Because heat has no options to control this I have only two ways to achieve the goal. First - remove unwanted files before the heat goes through the directory. Second – remove unwanted Components from generated wxs file by applying xsl transformation. I prefer the first solution (because del command is much more simpler than xslt language). So before building .msi file my pre-build process should execute steps like this: 1. Copy files from output directory of C# project to the temporary directory 2. Delete unwanted files from the directory 3. Run heat to generate list of files in this directory My question was about step 1. It would be nice if Votive be able to copy content of referenced project to its own output directory. This would allow me not to write relative paths to output directories of referenced projects manually. But everything looks like it’s not possible. Also note that I’m not be able to use Votive variables like $(var.ProjectName.foo) at the heat command prompt. I have to provide heat by the full path to the directory with files. Ilya Serbis > Hi, > That is not entirely correct. When you reference one project to > another, msbuild doesn't copy anything. It simply makes the > reference project available to the target project. It is up to the > target project itself to decide what it's going to do with that > reference. In the case of a c# project, it decides to copy files > according to the "Copy Local" property of the reference, and the > "Build Action" and "Copy to Output Directory" properties of each file. > Votive, (the Wix Visual Studio plugin), does other things with > project reference. First, it makes the project available through > variables such as $(var.ProjectName.Whatever) (see the wix docs on > "project references"). Second, if you are using Wix 3.5 with VS2010, > you get options for "Harvest" (true/false) and "ProjectOutputGroups" that go > along with Harvest=True. > Those two harvesting properties will control how Heat builds .wxs > files from your project. Those end up in the obj subdirectory, and > then passed in to Candle during the build process. > Whether files from your c# project make their way to your final > output directory in Wix depends on a whole lot of things. For > example, you may be using a compressed package where all your files > go inside cabinets and those get embedded in the msi. There may be > different Media elements defined in your package, or you may be > using those files in some other way inside your wix project. > Hopefully you now understand why you don't get files in your output > directory just from making the project reference. That would go > against all of the reasons that you build a wix project in the first place. > Now - if what you really want to know is how to get files from your > referenced c# package into your output directory without them being > embedded in an msi, it's fairly simple: > 1) Set Compressed="no" on your package > 2) Reference your project and use the harvesting properties. > The only downside to this is that ALL your harvested files will end > up outside of the msi. To work around that, you'll need > Compressed="yes" on the files that you want inside your msi. The > problem now is that there's no opportunity to modify the .wxs > generated by the harvesting on the project reference, to get that > attribute on the files harvested there. IMHO, this is a major > oversight in Votive. We need the ability to provide transforms on the > project reference. > There is a workaround for this problem - You have to turn OFF > harvesting on your reference and do it the old wix 3.0 way. > Basically, open up your wixproj file and add an item group like such: > <ItemGroup> > <HarvestProject Include="..\MyWebApp.csproj"> > <ProjectOutputGroups>Content;Binaries</ProjectOutputGroups> > <Transforms>MyWebTransform.xslt</Transforms> > <Link>MyWebApp.csproj</Link> > </HarvestProject> > </ItemGroup> > Don't delete the reference though, it is still useful for the > $(var.ProjectName.Whatever) variables. Just set Harvest=False. > Now you can create an xslt for heat to use to add the > Compressed="yes" attribute to your File elements in the generated wxs. > I know this is an ugly workaround. I hope someone that works on > Votive is listening. This is a great example of why we need to be > able to specify transforms as a property on the project reference. > Matt Johnson MCPD, MCTS, MCSD, MCDBA > Director of Application Development > Time America, Inc. > ma...@timeamerica.com | www.timeamerica.com > -----Original Message----- > From: Илья Сербис [mailto:iser...@shtrih-m.ru] > Sent: Thursday, May 13, 2010 8:08 AM > To: wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net > Subject: [WiX-users] Adding reference to WiX project doesn't lead > to copy referenced project's files > Hello! > I have WiX project included into Visual Studio solution along with > other projects written on C#. In order to automate build process I > need to get output files from some of C# projects, and add them to > msi file. > Usually when you add reference from one C# project to another, > msbuild copy files from output dir of referenced project to the > referrer's folder. But this rule is not applicable to WiX projects. > I've made reference from WiX project to one of C# projects but haven't > got any files from C# project in WiX output directory. Is it possible > to make standard references (which allow files to be copied)? > After getting all of the files in WiX output dir I'm going to filter > out some of them (in pre-build event) and then automatically generate > the list by the heat utility (also in pre-build event). It's simpler > than filter out Components through the xsl transformation from wxs > file generated by the heat. > Another issue I faced with: usually when I add file to C# project as a > link I can set "Copy if newer" option for this file in it's properties > window. But in case of WiX projects there is no such option. May be I > missed something? > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > _______________________________________________ > WiX-users mailing list > WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > _______________________________________________ > WiX-users mailing list > WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users > !DSPAM:3680870,4bec458b710861490510030! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ WiX-users mailing list WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users
