How to Create Build Pipelines in Azure DevOps

DevOps has been a Huge advantage when creating enterprise software but, even small projects can benefit from DevOps. This article will describe how to create build pipelines in Azure DevOps.

DevOps is the union of people, process, and technology to continually provide value to customers.

Microsoft, What is DevOps?

Microsoft’s Azure DevOps can make it super simple. It not only includes source code repositories and a superior bug tracker. Leverage powerful pipelines to build and deploy applications. They can be configured to trigger a build on each code repository check-in. Azure DevOps makes it a simple process to leverage continuous integration options for small projects.

First, you will need to set up your branch in Azure Repos. Not sure how? Check out the previous post about how to require pull requests in Azure Repos.

Create a New Pipeline

We have Azure Repos set up with a master branch and a develop branch. The develop branch requires a pull request. The next thing we’ll do is create a build.

First, we need to create a new pipeline. Navigating to Azure Repos > Pipelines we can see there are no pipelines:

Click the New pipeline button to start the process of creating a new pipeline. First is the Connect tab where you need to tell Azure DevOps where your code is located:

Select Azure Repos Git for this example since our code is in a Git Repository in Azure Repos.

After the connection is set up, the workflow will move to the Select step where you need to select a repository:

This one is easy for me – I only have one set up. Choose the desired repository. The repository should include the code that you wish to build with this pipeline.

After selecting a repository, you must configure your pipeline. There are a lot of templates available. Here is just a few:

I created a React app and will use the npm tool to run npm scripts. After selecting the tool, the yaml file will display. I made changes to it to support running the necessary npm scripts in my react app:

trigger:
- develop

pool:
  vmImage: 'ubuntu-latest'

steps:

- task: Npm@1
  inputs:
    command: 'install'
    workingDir: '$(Build.SourcesDirectory)/react-app/'

- task: Npm@1
  inputs:
    command: 'custom'
    workingDir: '$(Build.SourcesDirectory)/react-app/'
    customCommand: 'run build-test-ci'

Now click the blue Save and run button to the upper-right. This will display a form:

This will add the azure-pipelines.yml file to the develop branch and run the build.

Assuming the build succeeds, you have a build that you can leverage in various automation scenarios.