Visual Studio Team System (VSTS) Blog - by Neno Loje : TFS 2005

VSTS Whitepapers by Microsoft

neno — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 20:21:53 GMT

Planning

Visual Studio Team System 2008 Licensing White Paper (pdf/xps/docx)
Team Development with Visual Studio Team Foundation Server Guide (pdf/book)
Team System Web Access 2008 Scalability Limits White Paper (pdf/xps/docx)

Installation, Configuration & Administration

Requirements Management

Requirements Management with Visual Studio Team System White Paper (pdf/xps/docx)

Version Control

TFS Branching Guide 2.0 (pdf/zip)

Q: How Do I link work items with SharePoint documents?

neno — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 20:46:38 GMT

A: Two possible ways:

Step 1: Get the URL of the document saved in a SharePoint document library

From the project portal:

Right-click the file and select Copy Shortcut. Done.

From the Team Explorer window in Visual Studio:

Right-click the file under the Documents folder and select Properties.

The quickest way is to double-click on "Url", then right-click the blue-marked URL on the right side and select Copy (or press Ctrl+C respectively).

Step 2: Add the link to the work item

Select Add on the work item's Links tab:

Select the a link type of "Hyperlink":

Paste the URL and enter a comment optionally:

Confirm with "OK".

Done.

Ways to access Team Foundation Server

neno — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 18:16:29 GMT

Pick your favorite tool for your task/job:

From Visual Studio:

Visual Studio 2008: Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Explorer (+ SP1)
Visual Studio 2005: Visual Studio Team System 2005 Team Explorer (+ SP1)
older Visual Studio versions and VSS clients: via MSSCCI-Provider*
(includes Visual Studio .NET 2003, Visual C++, Visual FoxPro, Visual Basic, MS Access, SQL Management Studio, FinalBuilder, etc.)

From the command line:

tf.exe *: Version Control
tfpt.exe *: Work Items, Work Item Types, Version Control
PowerShell scripts (soon to be released)

From the web browser:

Visual Studio Team System 2008 Web Access (TSWA)*

From Microsoft Office products:

Excel (2003+): built-in*
Excel (for reporting): How to: Create a Report in Microsoft Excel for Team System
Project (2003+): built-in*
(for project server integration use: Project Server 2007 VSTS Connector)
Outlook (2003+): TeamCompanion* ($) by Ekobit
Word (2007): TeamSpec* ($) by Personify Design
Visio Pro (2003+): stpsoft Storyboarding for VSTS* ($)
Visio (for reporting): How to: Team Foundation Server Reporting and Visio

From other platforms or IDEs:

Java UI and console client: Teamprise Explorer and Command-Line Client ($)
Eclipse IDE: Teamprise Plug-in for Eclipse ($)
Borland IDEs: SourceConneXion (via MSSCCI) ($)

From Windows Explorer:

As part of Team Foundation Server Power Tools* (soon to be released)
TortoiseSVN: via SVNBridge
Dubbelbock TFS by Benjamin Day Consulting

From other products:

MindManager Pro 7: Requirements Manager for VSTS*
SnagIt: SnagIt Output for Microsoft Visual Studio Team System*

From Windows Taskbar:

Tray icon client: Fissum*

Footnotes
(*) requires Team Explorer to be installed.
($) means the product is a commercial third party solution.

Version Control Tip: Excluding specific files from multiple checkout

neno — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 18:34:11 GMT

Question:

Can I define a file name, not only a file type (extension), if multiple checkout is allowed for the whole Team Foundation Server?

Answer:

Yes, that is possible, although the UI shows "file extensions" and displays it in a way that you might think that it's not supported.

As a result you can specify that *.cs files in general do support multiple checkout but a certain file called "specific.cs" follows exclusive-checkout logic.

Enjoy!

-Neno

Uninstalling TFS 2005 (services) on the app tier removes reporting services virtual directories

neno — Tue, 06 May 2008 15:19:00 GMT

After uninstalling TFS 2005 (services) from a standby TFS application tier the SQL Server Reporting Services were not available, i.e. browsing http://server/reports and http://server/reportserver/ resulted in a 404 error.

Workaround:

Run the Reporting Services Configuration Tool and recreate both virtual directories and re-configure the identities.

(Thanks to Daniel Hackel who administers this environment.)

Documentation: Team Foundation Server SDK (online version)

neno — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 13:55:34 GMT

From the contents:

Team Foundation Server Extensibility

Team Foundation Server SDK Architecture

How to: Run Team Foundation Server SDK Samples

Team Foundation Core Services

Work Item Tracking Extensibility

Source Control Extensibility

Data Warehouse Extensibility

Reference for Team Foundation Server SDK

Link: http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb130146(VS.80).aspx

How code churn is calculated in TFS 2005/2008

neno — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 13:51:28 GMT

Code churn [1] in TFS 2005 and TFS 2008 is calculated using a very simple algorithm: inserted + changed + deleted lines [2].

This is done independently of the contents of the line, which means that everything - incl. comments, blank lines, etc. - is counted.

[1] http://blogs.msdn.com/mohamedg/archive/2007/12/04/code-churn.aspx

[2] http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms244698(VS.80).aspx

FIX: An unexpected error occurred while trying to add a web part to a project portal in TFS 2005

neno — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:42:00 GMT

Due to a lot of requests about this pretty common problem.

Steps you did:

You browsed for a web part:
You selected one and hit "Add":
You got the error message: "An unexpected error occurred."

This is a know issue with WSS 2.0 and a hot fix [1] can be requested at Microsoft which corrects this behavior.

I tried this with various customers and we could then successfully add new web parts after applying it.

Enjoy!

[1] http://support.microsoft.com/kb/915746/en-us

Known Work Item History Limitations for Links & Attachments

neno — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:30:00 GMT

They are two major problems when looking into the history with regard to links.

1. No clue what has changed:
If you remove an attachment and add a completely different one the history will indicate that there was a change (revision gets in incremented by 1), but it won't tell you what has changed since TFS only tracks the numbers (e.g. number of external links).

2. Work Item links are only reflected in history on one side:

You have two work items: item 52 and item 53.

You decide to link item 53 with item 52.

Both items show the work item link under their "Links" tab.

Item 53 shows the new link in the history:

But the history of Item 52 shows no changes at all:

Whitepaper: Operations Guidance for Team Foundation Server

neno — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 12:25:02 GMT

Summary: You can manage your deployment of Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Team Foundation Server more effectively if you create your own operations plan. As you create your plan, you should understand key elements of the architecture of Team Foundation Server and how your deployment topology affects operations. This white paper explains those elements in detail, so that you can avoid common problems with your deployment.

Contents

Overview

Understanding Your Team Foundation Server Topology

Managing Service Accounts

Managing Groups, Users, and Permissions

Managing Backup and Recovery

Managing Configuration Information

Monitoring Team Foundation Server

Creating an Operations Plan

Conclusion

Author Bio

Additional Information

Link: http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb663036(VS.80).aspx

Method not found: 'Void Microsoft.Reporting.PreviewItemContext.SetPath()' when using Report View in TSWA

neno — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 03:46:00 GMT

If you get the following error message above when using the Report View in Team System Web Access…

… you need to install the Microsoft Report Viewer Redistributable 2005 on your TFS App Tier (as described here) to make it work again.

How it looks when it works

Open a work item or a execute a work item query.
Click “Tools” > “Report View”
This report should appear now:

Check-In is slow when using exclusive check-out?

neno — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 12:53:00 GMT

It’s still hot: Microsoft released a fix for slow check-in’s if you’re using exclusive check-out feature yesterday:

FIX: The check-in process may be very slow when you use the Source Control feature in Visual Studio 2005 Team System

Changing TFS email notifications to link to Team System Web Access

neno — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 14:44:37 GMT

Thanks to this MSDN Forums post I was able to change the link included in every TFS notification e-mail to point to TSWA instead of the project portal.

Here’s the full story:

When using project alerts to get notified about work item changes you get an email containing a link to the project portal:

If you follow the link you might get a bit dissapointed when looking at this very basic work item details page:

Since Team System Web Access is now avaible from Microsoft free of charge we can change the link in the template for all notification messages to point to the new TSWA.

Changing the e-mail template

On the TFS app tier open the folder:
%ProgramFiles%\Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Team Foundation Server\Web Services\Services\v1.0\Transforms
Create a backup of the file WorkItemChangedEvent.xsl, which we will be editing in the next step.
Replace the text:

<xsl:value-of select="DisplayUrl" />

with:

<xsl:value-of select="concat(substring-before(DisplayUrl,':8080/WorkItemTracking/WorkItem.aspx?artifactMoniker='),':8090/wi.aspx?id=',substring-after(DisplayUrl,'artifactMoniker='))" />

The bold printed 8090 is the port where you installed TSWA at.
Save the file and you are done.

If you now get a new notification e-mail and click on the link you’ll see the following much nicer work item details form provided by TSWA:

Note: Be aware that you either need to use Windows authentication with TSWA to make this work or you need to be already logged in and the session must be still alive.

I published a 2nd part: Changing TFS emails to link to Team System Web Access – Part 2

How to remove someone else's workspace in TFS

neno — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 15:59:27 GMT

A customer asked:

“During my vacation my collegue was working on my machine and mapped the solution file to D:\Projects. Now I returned and wanted to map the solution to that folder as well, which obviously doesn’t work since it is already mapped.

How can I get rid of the workspace that my collegue has on my machine? (Since he won’t be working on my machine anymore it can be freely deleted.)”

First of all: you obviously need to be either the owner of the workspace or have the Administer workspaces permission on the Team Foundation Server to perform this.

Deleting a workspace using the command line

The command is:

tf workspace /delete [/server:servername] workspacename[;workspaceowner]

Source: MSDN

Deleting a workspace using GUI

If you prefer a rich UI you can use the free Team Foundation Sidekicks tool by Attrice Corp.

Hotfix for: Microsoft.TeamFoundation.VersionControl.Adapter: An error occurred while processing changeset

neno — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 15:23:37 GMT

If you have the following error occurring every periodically when your warehouse is updated…

The description text is as follows:

Event Type: Error
Event Source: TFS Warehouse
Event Category: None
Event ID: 3000
Date:  nn/nn/nnnn
Time:  10:58:00
User:  N/A
Computer: Computer name
Description:
TF53010: An unexpected condition has occurred in a Team Foundation component. The information contained here should be made available to your site administrative staff.
Technical Information (for the administrative staff):
Date (UTC): 30.08.2007 08:58:00
Machine: Computer name
Application Domain: /LM/W3SVC/3/Root/Warehouse-3-128328371118437500
Assembly: Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Warehouse, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a; v2.0.50727
Process Details:
Process Name: w3wp
Process Id: 3413
Thread Id: 4027
Account name: TFSService Account

Detailed Message: Microsoft.TeamFoundation.VersionControl.Adapter: An error occurred while processing changeset ChangesetID, unexpected exception:
Exception Message: Object reference not set to an instance of an object. (type NullReferenceException)

Exception Stack Trace:    at Microsoft.TeamFoundation.VersionControl.Adapter.VCAdapter.persistChangesetInformation(FilePair fp, String sidForUserThatMadeChange, Boolean doOnlyRenameDebit)
   at Microsoft.TeamFoundation.VersionControl.Adapter.VCAdapter.processChangesets()

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

… there is help! Microsoft released a hot fix a few days ago:

FIX: When the Microsoft.TeamFoundation.VersionControl.Adapter adapter processes a changeset, the adapter may fail in Visual Studio 2005 Team Foundation Server
Get it at: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/940229/

Creating a separate work item form layout for Web Access

neno — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 16:32:00 GMT

Right now custom work item controls [1] are not supported by Team System Web Access [2]. Instead your custom control you will see this unpleasant message: “Unable to create workitem control ‘ControlName’”.

While this is a sad thing for us users does that mean that we shouldn’t use Web Access? No, of course not…

One solution is to create a separate work item form layout for Web Access and remove all custom controls from it. (thanks to Serkan and Marcus for pointing me in that direction.)

All you need to do is duplicate the <layout> information in your work item xml file.

Let’s do it

The first section gets a target-attribute with the value “WinForms” like this:

<Layout Target=“WinForms”>

The second targets the “Web”:

<Layout Target=”Web”>

Last thing you need to do is change the “Type” attributes of all controls in the web layout to use “FieldControl” instead of your custom control.

Review the results

If you take my Priority Control example from [1] it would look like this:

Windows layout (in Team Explorer) will show the friendly priority list (= the custom control):

Web layout in Team System Web Access doesn’t show the control, but instead it displays the regular field control. Not nice, but usable – and much better than the initial error message we had.

[1] http://msmvps.com/blogs/vstsblog/archive/2007/07/07/starting-using-custom-work-item-controls.aspx

[2] http://msmvps.com/blogs/vstsblog/archive/2007/08/27/free-add-on-team-system-web-access-tswa-power-tool-by-microsoft.aspx

Listing version control changes with check-in comments using TFS

neno — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 16:36:34 GMT

You can easily query for changes on a team project or a specified version control folder underneath and display them in a list with the check-in comments.

By using Team System Web Access (TSWA):

Note: I’m showing this first because the dialog is very comfortable, e.g. you can filter by user or time range.

In TSWA on the “Source” tab, right-click any folder (team project folder or sub-folder) and select “Find Changesets”.
In the “Find Changesets” dialog, select the desired filter criteria and confirm with “Find” to generate a list of changesets with check-in comments.

By using Visual Studio Team Explorer:

In Team Explorer under “Source Control”, right-click any folder and choose “View History” from the context menu.
The “History” window is shown with a list of all changesets (again with check-in comments) of the folder and sub-folders, which – as far as I know – cannot be filtered further.

By using Team Foundation Sidekicks (a free tool by Attrice):

Start Team Foundation Sidekicks and open the History Sidekick by clicking on the third toolbar button (the clock with an arrow on it).
On the left side, select a folder by clicking on it.
On the right side in the “History” tab you will see the changes with an option to filter them by user.

Enabling email functionality in Team System Web Access (TSWA)

neno — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 16:28:42 GMT

By default, the email functionality in Team System Web Access (TSWA) is disabled and users will receive the following message when trying to use it:

“Sending email is not enabled. Please contact your administrator.”

To enable you need to change TSWA’s web.config file, which can be found under %ProgramFiles%\Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Team System Web Access\Web.

Change the setting “sendingEmailEnabled” to true.
And specify your SMTP server name under “host”.

Optionally you can specify which account to use when authenticating with the SMTP server and if SSL should be enabled as well as the default email address for the sender.

Where can you use the email functionality?

You can send…

single work items (from the work item form)
multiple work items, i.e. the result of a work item query

The email function can be found in the “Tools” menu.

The “Send Email” window allows you to specify the sender’s (“From”) and receiver’s (“To”) email address, as well as subject and message.

After hitting send a message box confirms that the mail was successfully routed to the email server.

This is how the receiver will see the message if it’s about a single work item:

… or about a work item query result:

Free Add-On: Team System Web Access (TSWA) Power Tool by Microsoft

neno — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 16:10:07 GMT

Microsoft now offers version 2.0 of the Team System Web Access (formerly known as TeamPlain Web Access from DevBiz, which was acquired by Microsoft ) free of charge as a Power Tool with official Microsoft Customer Service support!

Download it from here.

Get a detailed list of all improvements here.

Make sure to read the Visual Studio Team System Web Access FAQ.

Copy area and interation structure using the Area Import/Export Tool

neno — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 19:21:48 GMT

If you look for a way to export and import your area and/or iteration structure the Team Foundation Object Model (TFOM) is your friend.

However it’s only your friend if you know where to look for.

While the export works perfectly using the WorkItemStore, the import is only possible through the ICommonStructureService (and could be used for export as well).

At the bottom you can download the source code of TFS Area Import/Export Tool.

It saves your area and/or iteration structure into a text file and lets you import it into another project (even on another Team Foundation Server).

Feedback is appreciated.

Version 1.0.1 – compiled against Team Explorer 2008
File Attachment: AreaImportExportTool_1.0.1.zip (25 KB)

Version 1.0.0 – compiled against Team Explorer 2005
File Attachment: AreaImportExportTool.zip (69 KB)