Is it possible to change the Build Action of a file in pre-build events?

Question

I want a file (robots.txt) to only publish when I am using a certain build configuration. Is there a way to handle this in pre-build events?

oleksii · Answer 1 · 2013-07-11T14:28:15.730

4

Yes you can do this. Two things that you may need to do:

Manual fiddling with the .proj file in text editor (or Visual Studio when project is unloaded)
Use of MSBUILD conditional execution

Sample code to get you started. Adjust it at will

<Target Name="AfterBuild" Condition="'$(Configuration)'=='Production'">
     <Copy 
            SourceFiles=".../robot.txt" 
            DestinationFolder="..."/>
</Target>

edited Jul 11 '13 at 14:28

answered Jul 11 '13 at 14:02

oleksii

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I can do that to copy the file but I need it to be included when publishing the site. Forgot to mention I am using VS to publish. – Mike Jul 11 '13 at 14:22
I am not sure how to do that from VS... You can extract a [publish task](http://stackoverflow.com/q/12221999/706456) or something that looks very close to it. I usually have a /build folder, where I put MS Build scripts. For web projects I add a publish.bat file, that calls MS BUILD script with publish params. So when I just click on that file it does the job. I tried to do similar things from VS, never got it running. It turned out to be much easier to use external script and bat files for me. – oleksii Jul 11 '13 at 14:27

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 11 '13 at 14:06

3

An other option would be to use the $(ConfigurationName) macro within the VisualStudio build events editor:

if $(ConfigurationName)=="Production" copy robots.txt destinationpath

answered Jul 11 '13 at 14:06

Jeldrik

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Is it possible to change the Build Action of a file in pre-build events?

2 Answers2