Shared Publish Profiles with User Specific variables

Question

We have a complex visual studio publish profile for developers to deploy files. I want developers to all to use the same publish profile whilst have some variables configurable for each individual user that don't get checked in to source control. Is this possible? If so then how?

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
  <!--
  This file is used by the publish/package process of your Web project. You can customize the behavior of this process
  by editing this MSBuild file. In order to learn more about this please visit https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=208121. 
  -->
  <Project ToolsVersion="4.0" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">
    <PropertyGroup>
      <WebPublishMethod>FileSystem</WebPublishMethod>
      <PublishProvider>FileSystem</PublishProvider>
      <LastUsedBuildConfiguration>Debug</LastUsedBuildConfiguration>
      <LastUsedPlatform>Any CPU</LastUsedPlatform>
      <SiteUrlToLaunchAfterPublish />
      <LaunchSiteAfterPublish>True</LaunchSiteAfterPublish>
      <ExcludeApp_Data>False</ExcludeApp_Data>
      <DeleteExistingFiles>False</DeleteExistingFiles>
      <PipelineDependsOn>
        CopyAssets;
        $(PipelineDependsOn);
      </PipelineDependsOn>
      <publishUrl>C:\inetpub\wwwroot\local.MyApp\Website</publishUrl>
    </PropertyGroup>
    <Target Name="CopyAssets">
      <Message Text="Inside of CopyAssets" Importance="high"/>
      <Exec Command="%WINDIR%\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -File &quot;$(SolutionDir)Foundation\Scripts\Powershell\CopyAssets.ps1&quot; $(SolutionDir) $(publishUrl)"/>
    </Target>
  </Project>

This is it in its simplest form. In this example I'd want developers to configure for example publish URL on a per user basis ideally in the .user file if possible or get a variable or parameter from somewhere we can pass into this publish profile.

Answer 1

I resolved this by creating a .wpp.targets file. I created one within the project I am publishing. This allowed me to define the Powershell I am running to run for all publish profiles.

This enabled me to allow developers to define their own publish profiles and still run the script allowing the publish URL value to be individual for each developer.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Project ToolsVersion="4.0" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/developer/msbuild/2003">
  <PropertyGroup>
    <PipelineDependsOn>
      CopyAssets;
      $(PipelineDependsOn);
    </PipelineDependsOn>
  </PropertyGroup>

  <Target Name="CopyAssets">
    <Message Text="Inside of CopyAssets" Importance="high"/>
    <Exec Command="%WINDIR%\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -File &quot;$(SolutionDir)Foundation\Scripts\Powershell\CopyAssets.ps1&quot; $(SolutionDir) $(publishUrl)"/>
  </Target>
</Project>

I removed the PipelineDepndsOn part from my publish profile and did it in the target file as I defined above.