The Code Project - Auto-Incrementing Build Numbers

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Auto-Incrementing Build Numbers
By Navi Singh

Describes a way to automatically generate an application build number.

	Beginner
	VC6, Win9x, NT4, MFC
	Posted 17 Feb 2000
	Updated 09 Mar 2000
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3.76 out of 5.

Download demo project - 35 Kb

Updated: 09 Mar 2000. See below for updates.

This code increments the version number on each build.

After including the autobuild.dll as an Add-In for dev studio, the following happens. When you do a build, a file autobuild.h is created/updated in your project's folder.

If you want to increment your version number with each build, set the flag INCREMENT_BUILD_NUM to true in the generated autobuild.h, AND make the file attribute for your project's .rc file to read-write.

#ifndef __AUTOBUILD_H__
#define __AUTOBUILD_H__
//change the FALSE to TRUE for autoincrement of build number
#define INCREMENT_BUILD_NUM TRUE
#define BUILD_NUM 2723
#endif //__AUTOBUILD_H__

If the flag is true, the project's version number stored in the .rc file is incremented. If the flat is false, or the .rc file is read-only, the version number is not incremented. That is the extent of the change brought about by including the add-in in the project.

In my project, I also use Manuel Laflamme's code from the CodeGuru.com site, to get the version number from the .rc file and display it in the help-about dialog box. Here is the code snippet that is used to get the version number within the code.

dlgAbout.cFileVersion.Open(m_sExePath + m_sExeName);
dlgAbout.m_sBuild = "Pro-JCL version: " +
dlgAbout.cFileVersion.GetProductVersion();

In the about box, I have a cstatic control that displays the version number.

This approach has been a real convenience in my interactions with the QA group. Hope you find it useful.

Update: 09 Mar 2000.

Download updated demo project - 61 Kb

MSDN recently provided a mechanism for incrementing the version number after each build. The key thing was that they slipped the version resource into the .rc2 file instead of the .rc file. I modified my addin to do the the same. i.e., follow their instructions for moving and modifying the version resource from the .rc to the .rc2 file. Then, add the add-in to your ide as before.

The file AutoBuild.h will be generated by the developer studio add-in and will contain the following:

#ifndef __AUTOBUILD_H__
#define __AUTOBUILD_H__
//change the FALSE to TRUE for autoincrement of build number
#define INCREMENT_VERSION FALSE
#define FILEVER        1,0,0,1
#define PRODUCTVER     1,0,0,1
#define STRFILEVER     "1, 0, 0, 1\0"
#define STRPRODUCTVER  "1, 0, 0, 1\0"

#endif //__AUTOBUILD_H__

Include the generated file in your project and set the INCREMENT_VERSION flag to TRUE if you want to increment the version number with each build. The version will be incremented with each build. i.e., 1,0,0,1 will become 1,0,0,2 ... 1,0,0,3 ...

By using FILEVER, PRODUCTVER, STRFILEVER, STRPRODUCTVER strings in place of the version numbers inside the version resource as the MSDN article demonstrates, we get rid of the irritating warning message from developer studio that its reloading the modified .rc file. That message motivated me to modify the code to use their approach.

Below is the MSDN / VCDJ documentation http://support.microsoft.com/view/dev.asp?kb=237870 for moving the version resource from the .rc file to the .rc2 file and making the appropriate changes to the version number strings.

Remove the version resource from the .rc file and place it in the .rc2 file:

Open both MyProject.rc and MyProject.rc2 (found in the Res folder), in a text editor. To use the Visual C++ editor, click Open on the File menu and select Text in the Open As list for the MyProject.rc file.

Find the version resource statements in MyProject.rc. It should look something like:

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
//
// Version
//

VS_VERSION_INFO VERSIONINFO
 FILEVERSION 1,0,0,1
 PRODUCTVERSION 1,0,0,1
 FILEFLAGSMASK 0x3fL
#ifdef _DEBUG
 FILEFLAGS 0x1L
#else
 FILEFLAGS 0x0L
#endif
 FILEOS 0x4L
 FILETYPE 0x1L
 FILESUBTYPE 0x0L
BEGIN
    BLOCK "StringFileInfo"
    BEGIN
        BLOCK "040904b0"
        BEGIN
            VALUE "Comments", "Sample Application\0"
            VALUE "CompanyName", "Microsoft Corp.\0"
            VALUE "FileDescription", "MyProject MFC Application\0"
            VALUE "FileVersion", "1, 0, 0, 1\0"
            VALUE "InternalName", "MyProject\0"
            VALUE "LegalCopyright", "Copyright (C) 1999\0"
            VALUE "OriginalFilename", "MyProject.EXE\0"
            VALUE "ProductName", "MyProject Application\0"
            VALUE "ProductVersion", "1, 0, 0, 1\0"
       END
    END
    BLOCK "VarFileInfo"
    BEGIN
        VALUE "Translation", 0x409, 1200
    END
END

Cut the version resource from the MyProject.rc file and paste it into the MyProject.rc2 file below the comment "Add manually edited resources here." For information about what each one of the fields in the resource means, see the VERSIONINFO resource statement in Help.

Replace the FILEVERSION and PRODUCTVERSION data with macros FILEVER and PRODUCTVER. Similarly, replace the FileVersion and ProductVersion string data with the macros STRFILEVER and STRPRODUCTVER.

Add a #include AutoBuild.h immediately before the VS_VERSION_INFO resource statement. Now the version resource will look like:

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
//
// Version
//
#include "AutoBuild.h"
VS_VERSION_INFO VERSIONINFO
 FILEVERSION FILEVER
 PRODUCTVERSION PRODUCTVER
 FILEFLAGSMASK 0x3fL
#ifdef _DEBUG
 FILEFLAGS 0x1L
#else
 FILEFLAGS 0x0L
#endif
 FILEOS 0x4L
 FILETYPE 0x1L
 FILESUBTYPE 0x0L
BEGIN
    BLOCK "StringFileInfo"
    BEGIN
        BLOCK "040904b0"
        BEGIN
            VALUE "Comments", "Sample Application\0"
            VALUE "CompanyName", "Microsoft Corp.\0"
            VALUE "FileDescription", "MyProject MFC Application\0"
            VALUE "FileVersion", STRFILEVER
            VALUE "InternalName", "MyProject\0"
            VALUE "LegalCopyright", "Copyright (C) 1997\0"
            VALUE "OriginalFilename", "MyProject.EXE\0"
            VALUE "ProductName", "MyProject Application\0"
            VALUE "ProductVersion", STRPRODUCTVER
        END
    END
    BLOCK "VarFileInfo"
    BEGIN
        VALUE "Translation", 0x409, 1200
    END
END

The file AutoBuild.h will be generated by the developer studio add-in and will contain the following:

#ifndef __AUTOBUILD_H__
#define __AUTOBUILD_H__
//change the FALSE to TRUE for autoincrement of build number
#define INCREMENT_VERSION FALSE
#define FILEVER        1,0,0,1
#define PRODUCTVER     1,0,0,1
#define STRFILEVER     "1, 0, 0, 1\0"
#define STRPRODUCTVER  "1, 0, 0, 1\0"

#endif //__AUTOBUILD_H__

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