Visual Studio Team System (VSTS) Blog - by Neno Loje

Using rich HTML descriptions instead of plain text

Objective

Allow rich HTML formatting in description fields of the MSF Agile process template.

Note: The MSF CMMI process does support HTML formatting by default. In order to use it you have to enable the formatting toolbar (see Step 6 below).

Work Item Customization

Step 1: Add a new HTML description field

Since the System.Description field is defined of type string as opposed to type HTML we need to create a new field:

Step 2: Change the work item layout

Use your own HTML field instead of System.Description

Step 3: Refresh Work Item cache

Right-click "Work Items" in Team Explorer and select "Refresh".

Step 4: Enable the formatting toolbar

Right-click on the Visual Studio toolbar, find and click "Formatting":

A new toolbar will appear:

Result

Click into the description field and use the toolbar to format your input:

Optional Step 5: Copying the old descriptions to the new HTML field

It would be a pity to loose the existing descriptions so let's write a small utility using the Team Foundation Object model to copy the "old" descriptions to the new HTML field:

static void CopyOldDescriptions()
{
    // TODO: Change these values:
    string tfsName = "servertogo";
    string tfsProjectName = "WorkItemCustomization";
    string tfsHtmlDescriptionFieldName = "DescriptionHtml";
    string tfsWorkItemType = "Task";

    using (TeamFoundationServer tfs = TeamFoundationServerFactory.GetServer(tfsName))
    {
        WorkItemStore wit = (WorkItemStore)tfs.GetService(typeof(WorkItemStore));
        WorkItemCollection result = wit.Query(String.Format("SELECT [System.Id] FROM WorkItems WHERE [System.TeamProject] = '{0}' AND [System.WorkItemType] = '{1}'", tfsProjectName, tfsWorkItemType));
        List<WorkItem> affectedWorkItems = new List<WorkItem>();
        foreach (WorkItem wi in result)
        {
            if (wi.Description.Length > 0)
            {
                // Set new description
                string value = (string)wi[tfsHtmlDescriptionFieldName];
                if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(value))
                {
                    wi[tfsHtmlDescriptionFieldName] = wi.Description.Replace("\n", "<br>");
                }
                else
                {
                    wi[tfsHtmlDescriptionFieldName] += "<br><p>Old description:</p><p>" + wi.Description.Replace("\n", "<br>") + "</p>";
                }

                // Delete old description
                wi.Description = String.Empty;

                affectedWorkItems.Add(wi);
            }
        }

        if (affectedWorkItems.Count > 0)
        {
            wit.BatchSave(affectedWorkItems.ToArray());
            MessageBox.Show("Items updated: " + affectedWorkItems.Count);
        }
        else
        {
            MessageBox.Show("Nothing to do.");
        }
    }
}

Happy formatting. :-)