AxBuild.exe: A new build tool for AX 2012 R2

With the release of cumulative update 7 (CU7) for AX 2012 R2 comes a neat little build tool, AxBuild.exe, which has the potential to significantly improve the performance of the X++ compilation.

Located at %Program Files%\Microsoft Dynamics AX\60\Server\<AXAOSName>\Bin\ AXBuild.exe is a command line tool with just one command, xppcompileall that runs a full X++ compile for the Dynamics AX model store.

Compiling on the server tier, AxBuild starts several temporary AOS processes (called workers) that run concurrently and complete parts of the full compile. By default the number of workers is based on the number of available processors.

What excites me most about this advancement for AX is the opportunity it gives for automating builds (and even deployments). While this is not new for AX, a significant decrease in compile time makes it more practical for deploying built code quickly and provides a more compelling reason to use tools such as Team Foundation Server (TFS) as a means to control the release of code changes across environments. Another step further away to the sometimes tedious and error prone task of xpo deployment.

For a complete overview of AxBuild.exe, visit http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/d6da631b-6a9d-42c0-9ffe-26c5bfb488e3.aspx