msbuild-tools

Work with Visual Studio (MSBuild) projects directly from Visual Studio Code.

Feedback is highly appreciated! Let me know:

• Does this work for you?
• Are there any showstopping bugs?
• Any missing features?

Note: I may eventually merge this into vscode-xbuild-tools when I have time.

Caveats

• First release; my first non-trivial TypeScript/JavaScript program — expect some bugs, issues, and non-idiomatic code.
• Managing the project (adding files, changing settings, etc.) should be done using Visual Studio itself.

Features

• Build, Clean, Debug, and Run Visual Studio solutions directly in VSCode.
• Switch between build configurations (Debug/Release).
• Debug directly from VSCode — easily define debug configurations.
• Status bar items for quick access to build, debug, and configuration switching.

Demo

1. Create a project in Visual Studio

2. Open the project in VSCode

Example

The example subdirectory contains a working example.

1. Open VSCode in example/helloworld and examine .vscode/msbuild-tools.json.
2. Use msbuild-tools commands to:
   • Build, Debug, Run, Clean
   • Switch build configurations
   • Switch debug configurations
3. Use the status bar to build, debug, switch configurations, or kill the build.

.vscode/msbuild-tools.json example

{
    "solution": "${workspaceRoot}/helloworld.sln",
    "variables": {
        "MSBUILD": "C:/program files/Microsoft Visual Studio/2022/BuildTools/MSBuild/Current/Bin/MSBuild.exe"
    },
    "buildConfigurations": [
        "Debug",
        "Release"
    ],
    "platformConfigurations": [
        "x64",
        "x86"
    ],
    "preBuildTasks": [
        {
            "name": "Print a message",
            "program": "cmd",
            "args": ["/c", "echo [pre-build task]: Build Started"],
            "cwd": "${workspaceRoot}"
        }
    ],
    "postBuildTasks": [
        {
            "name": "Print another message",
            "program": "cmd",
            "args": ["/c", "echo [post-build task]: BUILD Finished"],
            "cwd": "${workspaceRoot}"
        }
    ],
    "debugConfigurations": [
        {
            "name": "test",
            "cwd": "${workspaceRoot}",
            "program": "${workspaceRoot}/x64/${buildConfig}/helloworld.exe",
            "args": []
        }
    ]
}