Tagging a TFS Git repository during a release

Question

I am setting our build/release environment using TFS 2017.

I set up the Build to run automatically after each commit, and when we are ready to release a version of our application, a Release is manually created, and then deployed to various environments.

We would like to tag released versions in our git repository in order to easily know which git revision correspond to a binary. The "Label Source" setting in the Build definition allows to tag a git revision at build time, but since we build on every commit that would generate a lot of tags which we don't care about (as they are not deployed anywhere until a release is made).

How can TFS be setup so that when a Release is created (or possibly, deployed to an environment), a tag is created on the corresponding commit in our Git repository?

Catafalque

Answer 1

You can add tags by using REST API:

POST https://{instance}/DefaultCollection/_apis/git/repositories/{repository}/refs?api-version={version}

[
  {
    "name": {string},
    "oldObjectId": {string}, (The current commit id the ref is at. 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000 when creating a new ref.)
    "newObjectId": {string}
  }
]

Calling Rest API through PowerShell:

$result = Invoke-RestMethod -Uri $uri -Method Get -ContentType "application/json" -Headers @{Authorization=("Basic {0}" -f $base64AuthInfo)}

More information, you can refer to Calling VSTS APIs with PowerShell (apply to tfs 2017)

Wadley

Brilliant! That's exactly what I needed. The commit ref is available in the release in the $(BUILD.SOURCEVERSION) variable, so I can assign the new tag to that revision. Here's the PS command that I used: Invoke-RestMethod $uri -Method Post -Body (ConvertTo-Json $body) -Credential $cred -ContentType "application/json" And the name property in the body should be set to something like: "refs/tags/v_0.9.234.2" – Catafalque

Thanks for the helping info. I would add a link to the relevant documentation page: learn.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/azure/devops/… – Ireneirenic

Answer 2

I have built a vsts extension that does exactly this: https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=jabbera.git-tag-on-release-task

Audet

That looks awesome! I'll check it out asap. – Catafalque

Answer 3

You can add a command line task in your release definition and use git command git tag -a vx.x $(Build.SourceVersion) -m "xxx" to add a tag, check the screenshot below:

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Update:

In order to avoid specifying the working folder where the git reop checked out, you can publish the $(build.sourcesdirectory) to drop folder in build definition, then in release definition, you can simply select the drop folder directory. Check the screenshots below:

Shipowner

Thanks a lot for the suggestion. But this only works if you know where to find a directory on the agent that contains a checkout of the git repository (C:\TFS2015Agent\agent_work\4\s in your example). What if the release happens on a different build agent? Or worse, what if somehow another repository was clone in the location where the git tag is executed. You might end up tagging the wrong repo! – Catafalque

Well, I supposed that would work... But it seems incredibly wasteful to package up the entire source directory as an artifact on every build just to add a tag to the repository! Imagine if the repo was 1 GB! Not to mention that that would include also the entire Git history, so you could be looking at multiple GB for a large repo. – Catafalque

Instead of publishing the sources folder, why not simply specify $(Build.Repository.LocalPath)as the working folder? – Canberra

In a release, the source hasn't been checked out, and $(Build.Repository.LocalPath) and $(Build.SourcesDirectory) aren't populated. I think the REST API is probably a better steer. – Mihalco