Purpose

MsBuild helper for Wix auto-harvesting (using heat.exe) during build.

See role in the build process:

Usage

1. In your Wix project (.wixproj) Install a NuGet package - depending on the type of a project being packaged to MSI use:

• for WPF \ Windows Forms apps: https://www.nuget.org/packages/WixAutoHarvest.ClickOnce
• for Web apps: https://www.nuget.org/packages/WixAutoHarvest.WebDeploy
• for console apps: https://www.nuget.org/packages/WixAutoHarvest.ResolveReferences

2. In your Wix project Add a reference to the project to be packaged to MSI

3. In Product.wxs add ComponentGroup include_cg to a Feature, see example:

<Feature ...>
	...
	<ComponentGroupRef Id="include_cg" />
</Feature>

3. [optonal] if you require any alterations to harvested file generated by heat.exe - create .xslt file and pass it in TransformFile property in your .wixproj

4. [optonal] if Platform of the target packaged project is not "Any CPU", add ReferencedProjectPlatform property to .wixproj with correct value, see example for "x86" platform:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Project ToolsVersion="4.0" DefaultTargets="Build" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">
  <PropertyGroup>
    <ReferencedProjectPlatform>x86</ReferencedProjectPlatform>
    ...

Development

Preparation

1. Clone this repo
2. Get NuGet API key from your account on nuget.org
3. Store API key locally: nuget setApiKey %API_KEY% -Source https://www.nuget.org/api/v2/package

Dev Cycle

1. Make changes
2. Package locally by: nuget pack
3. Install locally to a Wix project (add local folder with .nupkg as NuGet feed) and test that it builds
4. Once happy, commit your change and push to GitHub, build and publishing to nuget.org is now automated by AppVeyor

TODO

• Add testing stage to AppVeyor pipeline to automatically use the built package in a sample Wix project, and only publish it if test succeeded (see Dev Cycle item 3 above)
• Automate adding of a <Feature> with <ComponentGroupRef Id="include_cg" /> to Product.wxs during NuGet package installation.
• [BUG] Example ConsoleApplication1 won't build on a clean clone - fails with error "Unresolved reference to symbol 'WixComponentGroup:include_cg' in section 'Product:*'". However closing and reloading the whole solution helps.
• Consider using <RefTargetDir> from .wixproj instead of hard-coded INSTALLFOLDER. This potentially will allow to reference multiple projects to install them to separate directories. See also Rob's explanation about original harvesting feature and its use of RefTargetDir here: http://stackoverflow.com/a/15578516/902415
• Add example of XSLT for registering Windows Service, with automatic fetching of .exe file name from the AssemblyName of %(ProjectReference.Identity) as it's done in PublishReferencedProject target.