TFS 2010 Build ‘Partially Succeeded’ (Failed) without reporting any error

It sounds very strange when a build fails without giving any error. Recently while working with TFS 2010 build, I came across same kind of scenario. It took my lot of time to locate the exact cause of error. But finally, I succeeding in locating it.

Here is how summary report looks like for such a build. Showing no error at all. Still failed. Check-ins rejected. Very Bad.

 

 

 

Now, I thought of exploring detailed build log and look for a keyword ‘Error’. That worked and I found the error. That error was actually in Unit Test Run. As following image shows all tests have passed but still some error is reported by MSTest.

 

Now, I went back to the summary page to open unit test run results.

 

Here, highlighted section on test results window show that some other error occurred as all unit tests passed. So, I intuitively clicked that link and located the exact cause of the error.

 

So, that helped me to answer the strange question i started with.

 

 

A Better Build Explorer for TFS 2010

Recently, I came across this new project on codeplex. This looks simple but still it answers almost all usability issues with visual studio’s integrated build explorer. Issues like..

- Quickly Loading build history, with minimum clicks.

- Monitoring builds in progress

- Locating errors and warnings

- Easily going though huge build log.

I bet, if you are working with a huge number of builds in your organization as I do, you will immediately pin this tool to your taskbar.

It can be downloaded at :  http://buildexplorer.codeplex.com/downloads/get/379077

As it is opensource, you can also contribute.

Error MSB3482 : An error occurred while signing: Keyset does not exist

This is a build error got while building a .net project. This error basically indicates that certificate (.pfx) used for sighing the assembly has been expired. Make sure that certificate is renewed and error will disappear.

Clear Team Foundation Server Data cache

Each application tier for TFS maintains a file cache in order to help users to easily download their files. Now this is good. But over a period of time this folder grows and starts consuming lot of disk space. Some time back i faced this issue and found that cleaning this folder was the only option I had.

Though, it was not suggested anywhere but I took my chance and cleaned the data cache. Everything worked fine. As I deleted the cache folder itself, TFS also created this cache folder again. Yes our team faced some slowdown, but everything was normal after an hour.

Now how to clear tfs data cache?

1. Stop TFS application server.

2. Delete the folder Drive:\%programfiles%\Microsoft Team Foundation Server 2010\Application Tier\Web Services\_tfs_data. (If you are cautious, rename the folder rather than deleting it. For backup)

3. Start TFS application server.

4. Done.

For more details refer to following MSDN Article : http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms252458.aspx