On K. Scott Allen’s blog, you can find a really good description of how the build process for ASP.NET projects has changed from 1.0/1.1 to 2.0.

One of the adjustments to make when moving from ASP.NET 1.1 to 2.0 is how to produce debug and release builds.

….

Here is the most important concept to come to terms with in 2.0: Visual Studio 2005 knows nothing about compiling a web application. In 1.1 VS built the code-behind and ASP.NET built the web forms. In 2.0 Visual Studio 2005 delegates all compilation responsibilities to the ASP.NET platform.

….

Jump here for the full article, it neatly describes what has changed and how it works. He doesn’t go into why it changed, that’s the part I don’t get. What’s the advantage of the new build method? In the end, as long as I can get FinalBuilder to build it, I’ll be happy.