WSS: Development – Quick Start with WSPBuilder

So how to get started quick and easy with development of WSS features?

It is not that bad after all. You can

1. Use WSPBuilder as a starting point
2. Use an already build WSPBuilder feature as a starting point

For debugging a WebPart see here.

Before you continue you need to install WSPBuilder.

1. WSPBuilder start

1. Visual Studio – New Project – WSPBuilder Project
   
   => This gives you a WSS solution container for adding one or more features to.
   
2. Add New Item – (choose a WSPBuilder item – ie: Web Part Feature – you could name it MyWebpartFeature)
   
   Now select scope:
   
   => This gives you the \12\TEMPLATE\FEATURES\<MyWebpartFeature>\feature.xml and a
   \12\WebPartCode\<MyWebpartFeature>.cs file for adding the code in.
   
3. Add your code.
   
4. Continue with step 1 in 3. Deploy without setup.exe

2. Copy – Paste start

If you start off from a feature build with WSPBuilder then you only need a few steps:

1. Copy-Paste the source project.
2. Rename the target project name. Search-Replace the target project name.
3. Search-Replace the target namespace. Also replace the default namespace in the project properties.
4. Change file and directory names: If the project contains webparts:
   The directory \12\TEMPLATE\FEATURES\<MyWebpartFeature>
   and the file \12\WebPartCode\<MyWebpartFeature>.cs also needs to be renamed.
5. Continue with step 1 in 3. Deploy without setup.exe

3. Deploy without setup.exe

1. Visual Studio – RightClick feature project - Build (= Shift F6)
2. Visual Studio – RightClick feature project - WSPBuilder – Build WSP
   
   => This creates a .cab file called .wsp
3. Visual Studio – RightClick feature project - WSPBuilder – Deploy
4. Site (collection) – Site Actions – Site Settings – Site (Collection) features – Activate
5. Use the feature ie. add the web Part to a page and modify its properties

4. Deploying changes without setup.exe

Following deployment of already deployed feature. This is when you want to test a change of your feature:

• Visual Studio – RightClick feature project - Build (= Shift F6)
• Visual Studio – RightClick feature project - WSPBuilder – Copy2Gac (Or do IISReset and Copy)
• Refresh (= F5) the .aspx under test

5. Deploy with setup.exe

When you need to deploy to another server:

1. Add New Item – WSPBuilder\Solution Installer Configuration
   => This gives you the \12\Deploy\Setup.exe.config
2. Edit Setup.exe.config: remove line containing key=”FarmFeatureId”
3. Optional: Edit \Deploy\EULA.rtf
4. Visual Studio – RightClick feature project - Build (= Shift F6)
5. Visual Studio – RightClick feature project - WSPBuilder – Build WSP
   => This creates a .cab file called .wsp
6. Visual Studio – RightClick feature project - WSPBuilder – Create Deployment folder
7. Execute \%projectfolder%\bin\deploy\%projectname%\setup.exe on the target server
8. Site (collection) – Site Actions – Site Settings – Site (Collection) features – Activate
9. Use the feature ie. add the web Part to a page and modify its properties

6. Uninstall a feature

If you have deployed a web part feature that you need to get rid of do:

• Site (collection) – Site Actions – Site settings – Web Part Gallery – delete web part
• Optional: Windows – Assembly – Uninstall (or use GacUtil)
• Visual Studio – RightClick feature project - WSPBuilder – Uninstall (Or use STSADM)

7. Tips

• Don’t change version number of your project, since this is referenced from many files in the project. If needed then do a search and replace for it.

 Thanx to Erik Norström for introducing me to WSPBuilder - How can you live without it?