The following XML file shows a skelleton build file, that only contains a project and a target. See the references for the Phing Types and Tasks for information on how to use them.
<?xml version="1.0" ?>
<!--
The root tag of each build file must be a "project" tag.
-->
<project name="(projectname)" [basedir="(projectbasedir)"]
[default="(targetname)"] [description="(projectdescription)"]>
<!--
Type and task calls here, i.e. filesets, patternsets,
CopyTask calls etc.
-->
<target name="(targetname)" [depends="targetname1,targetname2"]
[if="(ifproperty)"] [unless="(unlessproperty)"]>
<!--
Type and task calls here, i.e. filesets, patternsets,
CopyTask calls, etc.
-->
</target>
<!--
More targets here
-->
</project>
Property Files define properties. Properties are stored in key/value pairs and may only contain plain text. The suffix of these files should be .properties, the default Property File for a Build File is build.properties
# Property files contain key/value pairs
key=value
# Property keys may contain alphanumeric chars and colons, but
# not special chars. This way you can create pseudo-namespaces
myapp.window.hsize=300
myapp.window.vsize=200
myapp.window.xpos=10
myapp.window.ypos=100
# You can refer to values of other properties by enclosing their
# keys in "${}".
text.width=${myapp.window.hsize}
# Everything behind the equal sign is the value, you do
# not have to enclose strings:
text=This is some text, Your OS is ${php.os}
# I guess that is all there is to property files