Skip to content

Practice

Once Ntools is installed, Open a Developer Command prompt for Visual Studio 2022 and navigate to your solution folder (i.e. ./ntools). The .NET SDK must be installed and available in your PATH for build operations. The nb.exe is the main executable for the Ntools. The following are some examples of how to use the Ntools:

Global Options

Ntools supports global options that work across all commands: - --dry-run: Preview changes without applying them - --verbose: Enable verbose output for detailed information

Build & Test Commands

  • Build a solution: Compiles the solution in the solution directory

nb.exe solution
- Clean a solution: Deletes the release/Debug, bin and obj folders in the solution directory

nb.exe clean
- Test solution: runs all the tests in the solution with optional code coverage

nb.exe test

  • Run specific unit test suites: 

    nb UNIT_TEST_CLI_VALIDATION    # CLI validation tests
nb UNIT_TEST_GIT_CLONE_COMMAND # Git clone command tests
nb UNIT_TEST_ALL              # All unit tests (except long-running ones)

  • Create a stage release: Creates a stage build which includes the following steps:

    • Clean the solution
    • Build the solution
    • Run tests with code coverage
    • Generate coverage reports
    • Publish the stage build
    • Verify artifacts with smoke tests
    • Create a zip file of the stage build file
nb.exe stage
  • Comprehensive smoke test: Validates published artifacts and build system integrity
nb.exe smoke_test
  • Display available targets: Lists all the available targets in the targets file
nb.exe targets