Why doesn't a failed BuildPipeline.BuildPlayer return an error code in the command line?

May 08, 2017 10:53
Updated

Symptoms

Using -executeMethod and BuildPipeline.BuildPlayer fails when running Unity from the command line, and the exit code 0 (successful) is received where fail is expected.

Cause

When a build fails when using BuildPipeline.BuildPlayer, Unity will continue working on the method after BuildPipeline.BuildPlayer has completed. Once the entire method is run, Unity will stop returning the successful error code.

If there are any exceptions or crashes when opening the project, an error code of failed will be returned.

Resolution

BuildPipeline.BuildPlayer returns a string - if this string is empty, the build was successful. The following code shows an example of reading the error and exiting Unity, sending the value 0 if the build was successful and 1 if it failed.

string error = BuildPipeline.BuildPlayer( levels, "iOS ", BuildTarget.iOS, BuildOptions.None );
if( string.IsNullOrEmpty( error ) )
    EditorApplication.Exit( 0 );
else
    EditorApplication.Exit( 1 );

Alternatively, if a specific exit code is required (not 1), then when an exception is thrown (for example throw new System.Exception( "error message" );), Unity Editor will exit with exit code 1.

Note that when calling EditorApplication.Exit from script, -quit is not necessary to automatically exit the Editor once it is completed as the method will already exit the Editor before the end. If an exception is thrown or other errors occur, however, the Editor will remain open if -quit is not used.

More Information

For more information, consult the following documentation:

Comments

3 comments

Jordi Bonastre

December 13, 2017 13:13
Perfect for my Jenkins system =)
0
Casey Pugh

July 13, 2020 17:55

Edited
This was updated in a later Unity version. BuildPlayer now returns BuildReport. I fixed it by doing:
```
if (report.summary.result != BuildResult.Succeeded)
{
   EditorApplication.Exit(0);
}
else
{
   EditorApplication.Exit(1);
}
```
0
Nguyen Thanh Dung

July 20, 2020 11:02
The if statement should be opposite, no?
```
if (report.summary.result == BuildResult.Succeeded)
```
Because Jenkins will mark as Successful if the exit code is 0, not 1.
1

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