Setting off a CC.NET build from NAnt

This post was originally published here.

One of the new features in CruiseControl.NET are integration queues with priorities.  By default, all projects can execute concurrently, but sometimes, I want to have a master build execute first, then dependent builds next.  This is fairly easy to do, using the integration queues, priorities, and force build publishers.

However, I have a strange situation where I actually need to force a build from a NAnt script (don’t ask).  There aren’t any command-line tools to execute CCNET builds, so I couldn’t use the task to accomplish this.  Instead, I’ll create a custom NAnt task.  To do this, I’ll need to create a new C# project and reference three key assemblies:

• NAnt.Core.dll
  • ThoughtWorks.CruiseControl.Core.dll
    • ThoughtWorks.CruiseControl.Remote.dll</ul> From there, it’s just a matter of creating a custom task to call into the CCNET API:

    [TaskName("ccnet")]
    public class CCNet : Task
    {
    private string _server;
    private int _portNumber = 21234;
    private string _project;
    
    

  [TaskAttribute(“server”, Required = true)] public string Server { get { return _server; } set { _server = value; } }

  [TaskAttribute(“portnumber”, Required = false)] public int PortNumber { get { return _portNumber; } set { _portNumber = value; } }

  [TaskAttribute(“project”, Required = true)] public string ProjectName { get { return _project; } set { _project = value; } }

  protected override void ExecuteTask() { RemoteCruiseManagerFactory factory = new RemoteCruiseManagerFactory(); string url = string.Format(“tcp://{0}:{1}/CruiseManager.rem”, Server, PortNumber); ICruiseManager mgr = factory.GetCruiseManager(url);

  <span class="kwrd">string</span> proj = mgr.GetProject(ProjectName);
  
  mgr.ForceBuild(ProjectName); } }
  

</pre> </div>

    The custom NAnt task needs at least two pieces of information to connect to the CCNET server:
    
      * Server name 
          * Project name</ul> 
        If the remoting port is different than the default (21234), I&#8217;ll need to specify that as well.&nbsp; Now I can execute a CCNET build with this simple NAnt task:
        
        <pre><span style="color: blue">&lt;</span><span style="color: #a31515">ccnet</span><span style="color: blue"> </span><span style="color: red">server</span><span style="color: blue">=</span>"<span style="color: blue">buildserver</span>"<span style="color: blue"> </span><span style="color: red">project</span><span style="color: blue">=</span>"<span style="color: blue">Ecommerce CI</span>"<span style="color: blue"> /&gt;</span></pre>
        
        I&#8217;d still rather use the integration queues, priorities, and publishers, but the NAnt task will work for me in a more complex scenario.