How to Automate Builds with TeamCity (Part 3)

Please notice that this is a multi-part, step-by-step guide, on how to automate builds in TeamCity CI Server. You can find the parent article here, which has links to all the related posts.

Part 3:  Creating the Build Step in TeamCity

With the Build Project already in place, we can go on and create the actual build step, for TeamCity to be able to compile and build our solution.

1. Click on the Add Build Step so we can add the first build step for our project.
   
   
   
2. You will be taken to the Build Step configuration page. Here you need to select the build tool, which we already defined as MSBuild.
3. Enter the step name.
4. Enter the build file path, which is relative to the checkout directory you already configured in the VCS settings. In my case is a bit redundant, because the application root folder has the same name as the solutions folder, but you can change it according to your own solution’s folder structure.
5. Select the MSBuild version and platform.
6. Before clicking the “Save” button make sure that your “Targets” field matches the target name you specified in your build script (which we defined before as “Build”).

Cool, so you now have your first and most important build step configured: the build step. This will enable TeamCity to build your application.

Normally, you will add a step to run your unit tests and then another to deploy your application on your server. In this case, let’s leave it here for now (I’ll be publishing follow up posts on how to configure the mentioned steps).

You will see a notification at the top confirming that the step was created, and now you should be able to see, edit or remove the build step you just created.

Notice that on the right side of the page you can now see the 7 configuration steps that are common to every TeamCity Build project: General Settings, Version Control Settings, Build Steps, Build Triggering, Dependencies, Build Parameters, Agent Requirements. You can come back at any time now to modify any of the steps.

Next:

Part 4: Configuring the Build Triggers in TeamCity