Publish and download Universal Packages with Azure Pipelines

Azure DevOps Services

Universal Packages allow you to package any number of files of any type and share them with your team. Using the Universal Package task in Azure Pipelines, you can pack, publish, and download packages of various sizes, up to 4 TB. Each package is uniquely identified with a name and a version number. You can use Azure CLI or Azure Pipelines to publish and consume packages from your Artifacts feeds.

Note

Universal Packages are only available in Azure DevOps Services.

Copy files

The Universal Packages task in Azure Pipelines is set to use $(Build.ArtifactStagingDirectory) as the default publish directory. To ready your Universal Package for publishing, move the files you wish to publish to that directory. You can also use the Copy Files utility task to copy those files to the publish directory.

Publish a Universal Package

YAML

To publish a Universal Package to your Azure Artifacts feed, add the following task to your pipeline's YAML file.

- task: UniversalPackages@0
  displayName: Publish a Universal Package
  inputs:
    command: publish
    publishDirectory: '$(Build.ArtifactStagingDirectory)'
    vstsFeedPublish: '<projectName>/<feedName>'
    vstsFeedPackagePublish: '<Package name>'
    packagePublishDescription: '<Package description>'

Argument	Description
publishDirectory	Location of the files you wish to publish.
vstsFeedPublish	The project and feed name to publish to. If you're working with an organization-scoped feed, specify only the feed name.
vstsFeedPackagePublish	The package name. Must be lower case. Use only letters, numbers, and dashes.
packagePublishDescription	Description of the package content.

To publish packages to an Azure Artifacts feed from your pipeline, the pipeline identity must have the Feed Publisher (Contributor) role on the feed. For more information, see Pipelines permissions.

To publish to an external feed, you must first create a service connection to authenticate with your feed. For more information, see Manage service connection.

Classic

To publish your Universal Package, add the Universal Package task to your pipeline and fill out the required fields as follows:

• Command: Publish

• Path to file(s) to publish: The path to the list of files to be published. Default: $(Build.ArtifactStagingDirectory).

• Feed location: Publish to an Azure Artifacts feed in your current organization or in another organization.

• Destination feed: Select the feed that you want to publish to.

• Package name: Select an existing package (to publish a new version of that package), or enter a new package name (to publish the first version of a new package).

  

To publish packages to an Azure Artifacts feed from your pipeline, set the identity under which the build runs as a Feed Publisher (Contributor). If your build pipeline is configured to run using the project collection scope, add the Project Collection Build Service identity as a feed Feed Publisher (Contributor).

If your build pipeline is configured to run using project scope, then the Project Build Service identity should be given contributor access to the feed. You can check the scope in which your builds run by opening the pipeline editor and checking the Options tab. For more information on feeds permissions, see manage packages with feed permissions.

To publish to an external feed, you must first create a service connection to point to that feed. For more information, see Manage service connection.

Package versioning

Universal Packages follow the semantic versioning specification and can be identified by their names and version numbers. Semantic version numbers are composed of three numeric components, Major, Minor, and Patch, in the format: Major.Minor.Patch.

The minor version number is incremented when new features are added that are backward compatible with previous versions, in this case, you increment the minor version and reset the patch version to 0 (1.4.17 to 1.5.0). The major version number is incremented when there are significant changes that could break compatibility with previous versions. In this case, you increment the major version and reset the minor and patch versions to 0 (2.6.5 to 3.0.0). The patch version number should be incremented when only bug fixes or other small changes are made that don't affect compatibility with previous versions (1.0.0 to 1.0.1).

When publishing a new package, the Universal Packages task will automatically select the next major, minor, or patch version for you.

YAML

To enable versioning for your package, add a versionOption input to your YAML file. The options for publishing a new package version are: major, minor, patch, or custom.

Selecting custom enables you to manually specify your package version. The other options get the latest package version from your feed and increment the chosen version segment by 1. So if you have a testPackage 1.0.0, and select the major option, your new package will be testPackage 2.0.0. If you select the minor option, your package version will be 1.1.0, and if you select the patch option, your package version will be 1.0.1.

If you choose the custom option, you must also specify a versionPublish value as follows:

- task: UniversalPackages@0
  displayName: Publish a Universal Package
  inputs:
    command: publish
    publishDirectory: '$(Build.ArtifactStagingDirectory)'
    vstsFeedPublish: '<projectName>/<feedName>'
    vstsFeedPackagePublish: '<Package name>'
    versionOption: custom
    versionPublish: '<Package version>'
    packagePublishDescription: '<Package description>'

Argument	Description
publishDirectory	Location of the files you wish to publish.
vstsFeedPublish	The project and feed name to publish to. If you're working with an organization-scoped feed, specify only the feed name.
vstsFeedPackagePublish	The package name. Must be lower case. Use only letters, numbers, and dashes.
versionOption	Select a versioning strategy. Options: major, minor, patch, custom.
versionPublish	The custom package version.
packagePublishDescription	Description of the package content.

Classic

From the Universal Packages task form, select a versioning strategy, or select Custom to enter your package version manually.

Download a Universal Package

YAML

To download a Universal Package from a feed in your organization, use the Universal Package task with the download command as follows:

steps:
- task: UniversalPackages@0
  displayName: Download a Universal Package
  inputs:
    command: download
    vstsFeed: '<projectName>/<feedName>'
    vstsFeedPackage: '<packageName>'
    vstsPackageVersion: '<packageVersion>'
    downloadDirectory: '$(Build.SourcesDirectory)\someFolder'

Argument	Description
vstsFeed	The Artifacts feed hosting the package to be downloaded.
vstsFeedPackage	Name of the package to be downloaded.
vstsPackageVersion	Version of the package to be downloaded.
downloadDirectory	The package destination folder. Default value: $(System.DefaultWorkingDirectory).

To download a Universal Package from an external source, use the following snippet:

steps:
- task: UniversalPackages@0
  displayName: Download a Universal Package
  inputs:
    command: download
    feedsToUse: external
    externalFeedCredentials: 'MSENG2'
    feedDownloadExternal: 'fabrikamFeedExternal'
    packageDownloadExternal: 'fabrikam-package'
    versionDownloadExternal: 1.0.0

Argument	Description
feedsToUse	Set the value to external when downloading from an external source.
externalFeedCredentials	Name of the service connection to the external feed. For more information, see manage service connections.
feedDownloadExternal	Name of the external feed.
packageDownloadExternal	The package name you wish to download.
versionDownloadExternal	The version of the package you wish to download.

Classic

To download a Universal Package, add the Universal Package task to your pipeline and fill out the required fields as follows:

• Command: Download
• Destination directory: Folder path where the packages will be downloaded. Default value: $(System.DefaultWorkingDirectory).
• Feed location: Download a Universal Package from a feed in your organization or in another organization.
• Feed: The feed that you want to download from.
• Package name: Name of the package to be downloaded.
• Version: The version of the package that you want to download.

Tip

You can use wildcards to download the latest version of a Universal Package. For more information, see Download the latest version.

Related articles

• Universal Packages upstream sources
• Search for packages in upstream sources
• Feed permissions