First MSBuild Project File

C# Tutorials - Herong's Tutorial Examples

∟First MSBuild Project File - Hello.proj

A tutorial example is provided to a very simple MSBuild project file, Hello.proj, to compile a C# source file, Hello.cs.

To learn how to use MSBuild, let's start with a very simple project file, Hello.proj:

<!-- Hello.proj
// Copyright (c) 2016 HerongYang.com. All Rights Reserved.
-->
<Project xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">
  <ItemGroup>
    <Compile Include="Hello.cs" />
  </ItemGroup>
  <Target Name="Build">
    <Csc Sources="@(Compile)"/>
  </Target>
</Project>

This project file is easy to understand:

MSBuild project file is an XML file with "http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003" as the namespace.
The root element is "Project".
The "Target" element defines C# compiler "csc" task, with source file defined in "ItemGroup/Compile" elements.

Running MSBuild with the above project file is easy too:

C:\herong>set "NET=\windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319"

C:\herong>%NET%\msbuild Hello.proj
Microsoft (R) Build Engine version 4.6.1055.0
[Microsoft .NET Framework, version 4.0.30319.42000]
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Build started 10:53:01 PM.
Project "C:\herong\Hello.proj" on node 1 (Build target(s)).
Build:
  C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Csc.exe /out:Hello.exe
  Hello.cs

Done Building Project "C:\herong\Hello.proj" (Build target(s)).

Build succeeded.
    0 Warning(s)
    0 Error(s)

C:\herong>Hello.exe
Hello world!

Cool. The MSBuild tool did a good job to compile my Hello.cs C# source file. But it used an older version of "csc" from .NET Framework 2.0 SDK. We will modify the project file to fix the issue in the next tutorial.