Jason Prickett's Blog
We have a new plugin for IntelliJ IDEA
If you are using IntelliJ IDEA and you have git repositories in VSO or TFS, you need this plugin....
Date: 10/23/2015
A new mission - Java!
The course of this blog will be taking a new direction. I have moved from build automation to a...
Date: 10/22/2015
Upgrading your build definitions from TFS2010 to TFS2012
There have been a lot of problems with compatibility of custom builds when upgrading from TFS2010 to...
Date: 10/24/2012
TFS 2012 – Cleaning up Workflow XAML files (AKA removing versioned namespaces)
If you haven’t run into this problem in TFS Build 2012 yet, you probably will… Problem:...
Date: 07/17/2012
TFS 2012 – IBuildDetail.RequestedFor is not what it used to be!
If you have custom build tasks or activities that rely on “build.RequestedFor” (or...
Date: 07/05/2012
TFS11 RC – Simple Build Summary Customization
So, I did a few posts when TFS 2010 released on how developers could customize the Visual Studio...
Date: 06/07/2012
TFS11 Beta – Batching Gated Builds
In TFS 2010, we added Gated builds. A gated build is like a pessimistic continuous integration (CI)....
Date: 06/05/2012
Using NuGet with TFS Build Automation
In case you aren’t familiar with NuGet, check out this link: https://www.nuget.org How does NuGet...
Date: 05/10/2012
TFS11 Beta - TfsBuildServiceHost.2012 service stopping unexpectedly
We noticed several early adopters running into an issue with the build service in TFS11 Beta...
Date: 05/08/2012
TFS11 Beta - The Builds Page
A picture is worth a thousand words… We will skip talking about the toolbar and the page title area,...
Date: 03/12/2012
TFS11 Beta – Team Explorer (a new way to get things done)
When you connect to TFS from a Dev11 client, you will see a whole new Team Explorer. Here’s what...
Date: 03/12/2012
TFS11 Beta – RELEASED!
Well, we finally got TFS11 to the point that we want everyone to see it! And just to encourage...
Date: 03/12/2012
TFS 2010 - Using a TypeConverter to display your custom Process Parameter list type
I just helped someone today with this common problem... "How do I get my custom list process...
Date: 01/12/2012
Inline Tasks for MSBuild that work with TFS
Someone asked a question about how to do something in MSBuild the other day. They were using the...
Date: 08/23/2011
TFS 2010 - Overriding build settings
This post is for those that are pretty familiar with the TFS Build features in Visual Studio. If you...
Date: 08/15/2011
TFS 2010 - Managing the hidden Build Service Host objects
If you use the TFS Build Automation Object Model, then you may have noticed that we have objects...
Date: 04/25/2011
TFS 2010 - Build menu ids and guids
Okay, so I wrote a post a couple of weeks ago and exposed two of the menu guids for Build. Since...
Date: 04/21/2011
TFS 2010 - Bulk Updating Build Definitions (Retention Policies)
In this post, I just want to help those of you out there that have upgraded from 2008 and need to...
Date: 04/14/2011
TFS 2010 - Adding a menu item to the Completed Builds context menu in the Build Explorer
So, I have gotten this question a couple of times... "How can I add my own custom menu item to a TFS...
Date: 04/08/2011
TFS 2010 - Viewing the Build Details Log View in Visual Studio is very slow
So, there are several things I want to talk about, but they all boil down to the perf of the Log...
Date: 02/08/2011
TFS2010 – Where is $(BuildNumber)?
So, I have been asked this very question a couple of times now which means it should be searchable...
Date: 01/26/2011
TFS 2010 – Making Your Build Log Less Noisy
So, I have been asked this question a couple of times now and so I decided to put it out there for...
Date: 12/09/2010
TFS 2010 – Ordering the Build Process Parameters On The Definition
So, I had someone ask this question about the process parameters on the Process tab of the Build...
Date: 11/30/2010
TFS2010 – Customizing the Build Details View – Summary View
In some previous posts (here and here), I talked about ways to change the log view part of the build...
Date: 08/09/2010
TFS 2010 - Build Security API
I had a request recently on how to “Secure” a build from code. While I am still not sure...
Date: 07/19/2010
TFS 2010 – Managing Build Process Templates (what are those?)
If you haven’t noticed already in 2010. New build definitions no longer use the tfsBuild.proj file...
Date: 04/08/2010
TFS2010 - Queuing a Build (from code) With Custom Process Parameter Values
I got a question today on how to access the process parameters of a build definition in 2010. If you...
Date: 03/25/2010
Using The Custom Assembly Path to Deploy Custom TFS Checkin Policies
First, what is the Custom Assembly Path? In TFS 2010, we added a feature to the Build infrastructure...
Date: 03/11/2010
Creating Fake builds in TFS Build 2010
It was brought to my attention that the code I posted here no longer works in TFS Build 2010. So, I...
Date: 02/23/2010
TFS 2010 – The New Build Definition Window
The build definition dialog is now a window! Why is that so exciting? Well, let me tell you… Now you...
Date: 01/19/2010
TFS 2010 – Custom Process Parameters Part 4 – Custom Types
In my previous posts, we discussed… Custom Process Parameters Process Parameter Metadata Custom...
Date: 01/18/2010
TFS 2010 – Custom Process Parameters Part 3 – Custom Editors
In the last post of this series, we added metadata to our custom process parameter and I described...
Date: 01/18/2010
TFS 2010 – Custom Process Parameters Part 2 - MetaData
This is a continuation of the Part 1 post. In the last post, we created a Hello World process...
Date: 12/23/2009
TFS 2010 – Custom Process Parameters Part 1
What are process parameters? These are the objects that we pass into the build process that...
Date: 12/23/2009
TFS 2010 – Displaying Custom Build Information in Visual Studio
In TFS 2008, we had a lot of requests to make the Build Details View customizable. In 2010, we have...
Date: 12/21/2009
TFS 2010 - How about those Build delete options
When you delete a build in Visual Studio 2010, you don’t just get a message box that says “Are you...
Date: 12/09/2009
TFS 2010 – What’s New On The Build Explorer?
The Queued Tab: So, as you can see not much has changed on the Queued tab of the build explorer...
Date: 06/15/2009
TFS 2010 Beta1 – Build DEtails View Log View section
The picture above is of the Log View of the new Build Details View in Visual Studio Team System...
Date: 05/18/2009
tFS 2010 Beta1 – Build Details View Summary section
The picture above is of the new “Build Report” in TFS 2010. I prefer the term Build Details View,...
Date: 05/12/2009
CollapsibleSection - Hiding Paragraphs until the user wants to see them in a FlowDocument
As I mentioned back in January, I created a collapsible section for use in a flow document. In my...
Date: 04/23/2009
WPF Documents - Indenting Paragraphs
As I promised, this is a post about what I learned while creating a flow document that had indented...
Date: 01/07/2009
WPF FlowDocuments - What, When, Why, How?
As I learn more and more about WPF, I am continually amazed at how much I don't know. I recently...
Date: 01/07/2009
Keeping Version Control Labels When Team Builds Are Deleted in TFS 2008 SP1
We have had quite a few complaints about the fact that we delete the labels created during a build...
Date: 09/30/2008
WPF - A Stretching TreeView
What is a stretching treeView? Recently, I found the need to have a TreeView in my WPF application...
Date: 08/05/2008
Filtering the Build Status Change Event (BuildStatusChangeEvent)
In an previous post (long long ago), I described some scenarios around why you would want to...
Date: 05/13/2008
Where's the TfsBuild.proj file for this Definition?
In Team Build 2005, the "definition" of the build was the same as the TfsBuild.proj file....
Date: 05/05/2008
WF - Creating an Activity Base Class
(or Designing Your Workflow Activity Class Hierarchy) One of the questions that we've had to...
Date: 04/23/2008
WF - The Asynchronous Activity/Service Pattern
In my previous blog post (Creating an Asynchronous Workflow Activity), I explained why your custom...
Date: 01/25/2008