Sometimes it is handy to get the latest version of certain types of files in TFS source control. These files may reside across many folders in a large solution so it can be painful to either download a large root branch or cherry-pick through a number of folders. With the TFS Power Tools and a…
Installing Jenkins CI on Windows
Replacing Cruise Control This afternoon I decided to start the process of trying out Jenkins Continuous Integration. We have a large application that has been using Cruise Control for years and while it has worked well, it is time for an upgrade. I have heard good things about Jenkins but I have been a bit…
Uploading SSRS Reports with PowerShell
The existing SSRS report deployment process I have been working with uses SQL Server’s RS Utility along with a custom app that creates RSS input files that rs.exe reads. Both applications are used by a PowerShell script that serves as the driver. In setting up a new machine at work I had neither tool installed…
Batch Download SSRS Reports with PowerShell
Lately our continuous integration process has encountered some errors with automatic SSRS report deployments to our Test environment when reports are merged to the appropriate branch. Unfortunately when this fails the process makes no attempt to re-deploy the reports on the next build. Those CI failures left me with a need to mass download the…
Start Scheduled Task and Wait On Completion with PowerShell
Some of our application servers have scheduled tasks to deploy a staged build of our application to the current app server. In the past when I wanted to manually run the task I would do one of the following: Remote desktop into the app server and run the task from Scheduled Tasks Use Computer Management…
Red Gate Schema Compare for Oracle Review
As part of my recent role in application release management, I have had to compare and sync various objects across Oracle databases. This was not fun work and I decided to evaluate some different tools to make this easier. The tool I have been working with recently is Red Gate’s Schema Compare for Oracle. In…
TFS Artifact Manager
The What TFS Artifact Manager is a tool intended for downloading application “artifacts”, such as database scripts and report files, from TFS. It pulls down these files from task source control changesets and attachments, organizes them, outputs task and change information, and helps combine and package database object changes. The tool’s primary value is doing…