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I have created a PhoneGap WP8 project and am trying to run it in the emulator.

phonegap local build wp8 works.

phonegap local run wp8 gives ERROR: MSBUILD FAILED TO COMPILE CordovaDeploy.exe.

I can tell from the printout that building the Cordova-WP8 Project is successful, then it says CordovaDeploy.exe not found, attempting to build CordovaDeploy.exe.... This build fails.

What works is building using PhoneGap and then opening the generated solution file in Visual Studio and run it in emulator from there, so there's nothing wrong with the SDK/emulator setup as far as I can tell.

Any solution to this?

Environment: Windows 8.1 PhoneGap 3.4.0 Windows Phone SDK 8.0

Printout: http://pastebin.com/5AWvATmM

HischT
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2 Answers2

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It seems there is an error building the CordovaDeploy.exe automatically, but you can work around this issue by building it yourself:

  1. in your app-directory, open the project in Visual Studio: "YourAppDirectory\platforms\wp8\cordova\lib\CordovaDeploy\CordovaDeploy\CordovaDeploy.csproj"
  2. build the solution (DEBUG mode)
  3. try again running your build process

Worked for me after running into the same error.

Christoph
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I have the same problem. In further text I'll describe step by step how I am trying to solve it as I stumble upon new problems.

I have added msbuild to my Environment path as follows:

;C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319

(I have .NET 4.5 installed as part of Visual Studio 2013 but it does not appear as a separate folder, since 4.5 is inplace upgrade).

At first I created my empty test project:

cordova create hello com.example.hello HelloWorld
cd hello
cordova platform add wp8

Everything fine so far. Then I did

cordova run

And failed the same way as you did. Full build log is here: http://pastebin.com/Wk4c5xWC

But now I managed at least to build and deploy. According to Microsoft instructions to redirect references automatically, you have to specify additional flag in the project file. Unfortunately, this flag seems to be new to .NET 4.5 so Cordova does not include it. Let's fix it ourselves.

Open C:\Users\developer.cordova\lib\wp\cordova\3.4.0\wp8\template\cordova\lib\CordovaDeploy\CordovaDeploy\CordovaDeploy.csproj

with your favorite text editor. Find the section:

  <PropertyGroup>
    <StartupObject>CordovaDeploy.DeployTool</StartupObject>

and add this code

<AutoGenerateBindingRedirects>true</AutoGenerateBindingRedirects>

Then we try to workaround the storage method call issue. Open

C:\Users\developer\.cordova\lib\wp\cordova\3.4.0\wp8\template\cordova\lib\CordovaDeploy\CordovaDeploy\Program.cs

and change

GetIsolatedStore()

to

GetIsolatedStore(null)

In the path, replace developer with your Windows user name. After that you need to recreate your project or update the existing one with the same changes as described above.

Although there are still some warnings in the CLI, but at least now it builds and launches the emulator. But now it says:

CordovaDeploy.exe compiled, SUCCESS.
Deploying to emulator ...
Connecting to device :: A6BAF594-9315-40C3-AD16-F5B8A425A7AB : Emulator 8.1 WVGA
 4 inch 512MB
Installing app on Emulator 8.1 WVGA 4 inch 512MB
Launching app on Emulator 8.1 WVGA 4 inch 512MB
The system cannot find the file specified.

Unfortunately, there is no file name mentioned. Nevertheless, the emulator is being launched and now it show me a nice Cordova logo with text Device is ready.

Then I noticed that obviously my Path is pointing to a wrong msbuild version. It seems, 4.5 framework is not completely in-place upgrade for 4.0. If I run msbuild from VS prompt, it shows:

Microsoft (R) Build Engine version 12.0.30324.0
[Microsoft .NET Framework, version 4.0.30319.34014]

but nodejs console says:

Microsoft (R) Build Engine version 4.0.30319.33440
[Microsoft .NET Framework, version 4.0.30319.34014]

Looking for the answer: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh162058.aspx

MSBuild is now installed as part of Visual Studio rather than as part of the .NET Framework.

Oh, Microsoft, you make thing complicated for us.

I changed the path from

;C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319

to

;C:\Program Files (x86)\MSBuild\12.0\Bin

and now no more warnings about referece conflicts. Still the same error "The system cannot find the file specified." after emulator starts.

While debugging the CordovaDeploy application I found that it's trying to open debugOutput.txt file. But when I enlist all files with var list = isoFile.GetDirectoryListing(null) I get the following output:

%FOLDERID_APPID_ISOROOT%\{cf473982-be59-4824-81ef-f04d20829bcb}\%LOCL%\DeviceID.txt
%FOLDERID_APPID_ISOROOT%\{cf473982-be59-4824-81ef-f04d20829bcb}\%LOCL%\Shared

As you see, there is no debugOutput.txt there. I thought maybe Microsoft or Cordova team has removed it or moved it somwhere else? But then whiule debugging I noticed that at one moment the file appeared and it came to me - maybe the CordovaDeploy tool is too fast for my emulator? I found this one:

// wait for the app to launch
Thread.Sleep(4000);

To be sure, I added the following code:

            string dbFilePath = Path.DirectorySeparatorChar + "debugOutput.txt";

            int waitForFileToAppear = 0;
            while (!isoFile.FileExists(dbFilePath))
            {
                Thread.Sleep(1000);
                waitForFileToAppear++;
                if (waitForFileToAppear >= 60)
                    throw new InvalidOperationException("Cannot wait for debug output file anymore");
            }

right below 

GetIsolatedStore(null)

in botrh my project and the default template. Now CordovaDeploy didn't crash anymore - it just hangs there doing nothing and also the demo app is just flashing that "Device is ready" message. As I found out, that's exactly what it's supposed to do. Well, I hoped for something like "This is an emty page. Fill it with your ideas" instead of the cryptic "Device is ready" but at least it works now.

I'm really sorry for the long answer but I wanted to show my entire debugging process so everyone could see what I might have done wrong because I'm just a beginner with Cordova and Windows Phone. Also, maybe Cordova team stumbles upon this and learns their lessons.

JustAMartin
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