2. Windows build - Use batch file and full path

[culix-7]

tldr:

• Move WindowsPreBuild steps to .bat file
• Add %~f path expansion for Dependencies.zip file so the build uses the fully qualified path

..

Hello, thank you so much for creating and sharing Mesen. It is absolutely fantastic. I very much enjoy using it and I wanted to try to give something back.

When building in Visual Studio on Windows 10 at the latest Mesen code - commit fabc9a6 - I get an error about "The file cannot be accessed" while building the UI project:

8>------ Build started: Project: UI, Configuration: Release x64 ------
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\Dependencies\MesenNesDB.txt
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\Dependencies\Internal\CheatDb.Nes.json
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\Dependencies\Internal\CheatDb.Snes.json
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\Dependencies\Satellaview\BSX0120-0.bin
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\Dependencies\Satellaview\BSX0121-0.bin
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\Dependencies\Satellaview\BSX0122-0.bin
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\Dependencies\Satellaview\BSX0123-0.bin
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\Dependencies\Satellaview\BSX0124-0.bin
8>8 File(s) copied
8>        1 file(s) copied.
8>        1 file(s) copied.
8>        1 file(s) copied.
8>Exception calling "GetFiles" with "0" argument(s): "The file cannot be accessed by the system.
8>"
8>At C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules\Microsoft.PowerShell.Archive\1.2.5\Microsoft.PowerShell.Archive.psm1:706
8>char:13
8>+             $files = $currentContent.GetFiles()
8>+             ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
8>    + CategoryInfo          : NotSpecified: (:) [], MethodInvocationException
8>    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : IOException
8>
8>The system cannot find the file specified.
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: The command "cd C:\code\mesen\bin\win-x64\Release\
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: rd Dependencies /s /q
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: md Dependencies
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: xcopy /s C:\code\mesen\UI\Dependencies\* Dependencies
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: copy libHarfBuzzSharp.dll Dependencies
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: copy libSkiaSharp.dll Dependencies
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: copy MesenCore.dll Dependencies
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: cd Dependencies
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: del ..\Dependencies.zip
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: powershell Compress-Archive -Path * -DestinationPath '..\Dependencies.zip' -Force
8>C:\code\mesen\UI\UI.csproj(654,5): error MSB3073: copy ..\Dependencies.zip C:\code\mesen\UI\" exited with code 1.

Have you ever seen this?

Potential Cause

I think this may be caused by my computer getting confused about the file path for the final Dependencies.zip zip file. It claims it is not able to find that file.
I am using Visual Studio 2022 Community, Version 17.14.23, doing a Release x64 build.

I'm not sure if this is an issue with my setup or if I did something wrong. My steps were:

1. git clone the mesen repo to a local folder
2. Open mesen.sln with Visual Studio 2022
3. Select Release and x64 build config
4. Click on Build -> Build Solution

My guess is that this is some difference between system environment variables and powershell's behaviour with paths, or what folders are included in paths.

Fix - Use the full path

I found that if I change the build script to use the full path for the zip file, then the build succeeds.
I went into the PreBuildWindows command and added a batch file %~f path expansion for the file path.
The build then succeeds just fine.

So I wanted to offer this patch to use the full file path.

Move build steps into batch file

To make viewing and maintaining the build steps a bit easier for humans, I took the liberty of copying the PreBuildWindows commands into a batch file.
This would let anyone view all of the steps in one place, e.g. inside a regular Visual Studio editor window, and be able to use regular newlines for spacing, instead of having to edit everything inside a Visual Studio properties window, or use the special 
 characters for newlines.

Thank you for your time.