MSBuild and Jenkins

The available build steps that Jenkins has out of the box are Execute Windows batch command, Execute shell, Invoke ant, and invoke top-level Maven targets. I am pretty sure that I've used Jenkins to build using MSBuild, back when I was playing around with it last spring, so either I need a plug-in or need to do some Googling to see how others have done it by invoking a batch command.

So I go to Manage Jenkins > Manage Plug-ins and begin to peruse... Of course this can be very distracting when you begin to find all the incredible plug-ins readily available for Jenkins. (A lava lamp notifier!?! Awesome!) I find the MSBuild plug-in and also select the Fitnesse, NUnit and NCover plug-ins since I am pretty sure I'll be using those as well. I congratulate myself on my self-control for not also getting the Twitter notifier or Google Calendar Plug-in. I DID get the Chuck Norris plug-in, but only because Lisa Crispin told us we had to. I have to manually restart Jenkins again when the installations are complete.

I then go back to my initial build project in the dashboard and click 'Configure'. Now I have the option to create a build task with type ' Build a Visual Studio project or solution using MSBuild'. It asks for an MSBuild version but my only option is 'Default'. It also asks for the name of the MSBuild file - I input the name of the .sln solution file - and for any command line arguments - I leave those blank for now. As a post-build action I, of course, select 'Activate Chuck Norris'.
I save that, go back to my dashboard and schedule a build. Again I need to refresh to update teh status, wchi, to my dismay, is failed. When I click on the little number that shows that build #2 failed I am taken to a page where I can choose to see more details. Also Chuck Norris boasts that no statement can catch his exceptions...

I click on Console Output and see the error from the build: msbuild.exe is not recognized as an internal or external command. Hmm, I knew that I was getting away with having to do too little configuration for this thing. Let's go see where I need to set that path to MSBuild. I'm guessing in the management of the MSBuild Plug-in.
It is actually in Manage Jenkins > Configure System under a section for MSBuild. You have to provide the path there. I chose C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319\MSBuild.exe though maybe I should have just selected the one under plain-ol' C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework. I'm going for broke.

I'll leave the MSBuild entry for my project as (DEfault) and see what happens. I may need to change it.

Turns out you do need to go back into your build configuration and select the version of MSBuild to run. I do this and WOOHOO... another failure. I'm missing a whole slew of other libraries that MSBuild looks for, but does not find. However, clearly MSBuild is taking control and attempting to build my solution. Only a matter of time and I will be checking out those other libraries and building these in some good sort of order... successfully.