MSBuild 1‑Week Learning Plan

Microsoft Build 1‑Week Learning Plan

Goal: Master MSBuild fundamentals and practical customization in 7 days. Designed for modern SDK‑style projects (.NET 6/7/8+), Visual Studio, and MAUI.

Overview

1. Day 1 — Introduction to MSBuild
   What MSBuild is, project structure, Properties, Items, Targets, Tasks, evaluation order.
2. Day 2 — Properties & Items Deep Dive
   Property evaluation rules, item transforms (@(Item->'...')), batching, metadata, built‑in properties/items.
3. Day 3 — Targets & Tasks
   Target dependencies (DependsOnTargets), BeforeTargets/AfterTargets, common tasks, writing a simple custom task in C#.
4. Day 4 — Build Process for .NET / MAUI
   SDK‑style conventions, implicit imports, Directory.Build.props/Directory.Build.targets, multi‑targeting.
5. Day 5 — Advanced MSBuild
   Property functions, conditions, incremental builds (inputs/outputs), graph builds, diagnostic logging.
6. Day 6 — Customization & Extensibility
   Creating reusable .props/.targets, overriding imports safely, solution‑wide customization.
7. Day 7 — Real‑World Scenarios & Labs
   Versioning, environment configs, CI/CD tuning, packaging/publish profiles, MAUI specifics.

Daily Outcomes

• Day 1: Read and write basic MSBuild; run a custom target.
• Day 2: Confident with properties, items, transforms, metadata, batching.
• Day 3: Model target dependencies; hook into existing targets.
• Day 4: Understand SDK imports and MAUI build pipeline.
• Day 5: Diagnose builds, speed them up, apply conditions and property functions.
• Day 6: Share and reuse build logic across solutions.
• Day 7: Automate real‑world scenarios end‑to‑end.

Prerequisites

• .NET SDK installed (6.0 or later)
• Visual Studio or VS Code
• Command line access (dotnet)
• Any sample .NET project to experiment

How to Use This Plan

1. Spend ~45–60 minutes each day.
2. Do the hands‑on exercises immediately after reading.
3. Keep a scratch .targets file to collect your reusable snippets.