MSBuild

At the core of the Deployment Framework is a tool used to build most modern .NET applications, and BizTalk applications starting with the 2009 release: MSBuild.  MSBuild is a “build engine” that ships with the .NET Framework.  When you build a C# or VB.NET solution in Visual Studio 2005 or newer, MSBuild is orchestrating the build.  Each .csproj or .vbproj file (just to name two common ones) is actually an MSBuild build file.

In essence, MSBuild is an XML-driven process execution engine.  The XML manifest/build files define build targets (similar to subroutines) and dependencies, reference files, define properties, and can call .NET extension methods (tasks).  The MSBuild engine is responsible for carrying out those instructions in the correct order.  MSBuild is much too complex to cover here, so please refer to MSDN and other online and print sources for detailed information.

The important thing to understand is that all actions carried out by the Deployment Framework are driven by MSBuild.  Your deployment project file (.btdfproj file extension) is an MSBuild file.

You need understand only the basics of MSBuild in order to work with the Deployment Framework.  If you wish to customize its behavior or add additional custom deployment steps of your own, then you may need to spend some time learning MSBuild.

TIP: If you are not familiar with MSBuild, I highly recommend reading this introductory blog post from the Visual Studio team blog.

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