Why is MSBuild expecting a Node.js project to emit an .exe?

I currently have an Azure Cloud Service within Visual Studio containing three roles - two ASP.NET Web roles and a very simple Node.js role.

This builds and packages correctly within Visual Studio locally, and deploys perfectly into the Azure compute emulator.

When trying to build the solution with TeamCity, MSBuild fails claiming:

[15:22:48]  C:\Program Files (x86)\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v12.0\Windows Azure Tools\2.3\Microsoft.WindowsAzure.targets(1253,5): error : WAT070 : The referenced assembly C:\TeamCity\buildAgent\work\a1a1a1a1a1a1a1a1\NodejsApp\NodejsApp.exe was not found. Please make sure to build the role project that produces this assembly before building this Windows Azure Cloud Service Project. [C:\TeamCity\buildAgent\work\a1a1a1a1a1a1a1a1\CloudService\CloudService.ccproj]

...which seems to indicate it's expecting the build of the Node.js project to emit an .exe file.

The project reference for the Node.js application within the Cloud Service project is as follows:

<ProjectReference Include="..\NodejsApp\NodejsApp.njsproj">
  <Name>NodejsApp</Name>
  <Project>{5b84f347-2866-40ee-9252-a1a1a1a1a1a1}</Project>
  <Private>True</Private>
  <RoleType>Web</RoleType>
  <RoleName>NodejsApp</RoleName>
  <UpdateDiagnosticsConnectionStringOnPublish>True</UpdateDiagnosticsConnectionStringOnPublish>
</ProjectReference>

The build server is running TeamCity 8.1.3, and has the following installed:

  • Visual Studio Express for Web 2013 Update 3
  • Windows Azure SDK 2.3
  • Node.js 0.10.30
  • Microsoft Azure SDK for Node.js 0.8.0
  • Node.js Tools for Visual Studio 1.0 beta 2

How can I persuade our build server to build this properly rather than expect the Node.js project to emit an .exe file?

August 19th, 2014 1:39pm

Hi Graham,

I am not good at Node.JS. But from the error message, we could try to generate a exe file for your project. So I suggest you could refer to this thread and try it.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8173232/make-exe-files-from-node-js-app

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/14314038/how-do-i-deploy-node-js-applications-as-a-single-executable-file

Any results, please let me know.

Regards,

Will

Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
August 20th, 2014 3:37am

Hi Will, thanks for your response.

Unfortunately I don't want it to compile to an .exe as it should deploy as a Web Role - so it should just be packaged up as a number of files in the same way an ASP.NET web application is.

I'm at a loss to understand why this occurs; it builds and packages perfectly from with VS.

Regards,
Graham

August 21st, 2014 1:58pm

Hey Graham,

I am currently having a similar issue, so I was wondering if you ever got this resolved?

Chris

Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
November 18th, 2014 5:38pm

Hey Chris,

Unfortunately not, we ended up parking it and deployed it to an Azure Websites instance for the time being instead. I am planning at some point to update the build tools, Node.js bits and Azure SDK on the build server and retrying it then

Graham

November 26th, 2014 12:44pm

Hi Graham,

Just on the off chance... Did you ever manage to get msbuild to build the nodejs cloud service role? I'm running into the same issue, build fine from VS but not using msbuild...

Best Regards

Martin

Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
June 4th, 2015 5:10am

Hi Martin,

Afraid not, though I haven't tried it again recently as more urgent things have been in the way for some time. Are you running the latest versions of everything required?

Kind regards

June 4th, 2015 5:15am

Having the same exact issue.

I wish someone would from MSFT would help.

Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
June 28th, 2015 8:54am

Having the same exact issue.

I wish someone from MSFT would

June 28th, 2015 12:52pm

This topic is archived. No further replies will be accepted.

Other recent topics Other recent topics