Monday, November 16, 2009

Brian Harry Sources Safe , and TFS 2010 Part 2/2

TFS 2010 represents a huge step forward in making TFS more approachable by smaller teams.  With software development technology continuing to advance and SourceSafe slowly looking older, TFS 2010 is a great opportunity for SourceSafe users to look at updating their toolset.

So what’s different about TFS 2010?

There are 3 main areas that we’ve focused on in 2010 to make TFS attractive to smaller teams:

  1. Price – We’re not quite ready to announce the pricing and licensing for 2010 yet but I can tell you that it will be at least as easy and cost effective to get as SourceSafe has been.  Stay tuned for more info on this.
  2. Pre-reqs – We’ve eliminated the vast majority of the restrictions TFS has historically had:
    • TFS 2010 can be installed on a domain controller – We understand that many small organizations don’t have spare servers lying around and they need to be able to consolidate their servers.  Now if you just have one server and it’s your domain controller, email server and whatever else you need it for, you can use it for TFS too!
    • TFS 2010 can be installed on client OSes – The TFS server can be installed on Vista and Windows 7 Home Premium and above.  Of course it can also be installed on server OSes (Windows 2K3, Windows 2K8 and Windows 2K8 R2).  If you want to run version control locally on your laptop – you can do that.  In fact, just to prove it out, I bought a Samsung N110 Netbook and installed VS 2010, TFS 2010 and a build server all on the Netbook, running Windows 7 and it works!
    • TFS 2010 supports both 32 & 64 bit – No matter whether you’re running a newer 64-bit OS or an older 32-bit OS, TFS will work on your system.
  3. Installation – Installing TFS has been a pain point for years.  Although it’s gotten better, 2010 represents a quantum leap.  The TFS installer now has 3 wizards: Basic, Standard and Advanced.  The big innovation is the new “Basic” install wizard.  It is a Next, Next, Next install experience that allows you to install and configure TFS in about 20 minutes or less (assuming .NET and SQL Express are already on your computer – a little longer if TFS has to install them for you).  Both will already be there if you’ve installed VS 2010.  The Basic wizard will install and configure IIS (if it’s not already there), install and configure SQL Express (if it’s not already there), and install and configure TFS.  The only thing that really pains me is installing .NET 4.0 requires a reboot :(.  Here are screenshots of the entire installation experience:

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And that’s it – TFS is installed and ready to use.  There’s a similarly (but not quite as) easy wizard for configuring a build server on the same machine…

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All of this gives you a development system with Version Control, Bug tracking and build automation (making continuous integration a snap!).  What it lacks from Standard TFS is Sharepoint and Reporting capabilities.  The great thing though is that TFS "Basic” IS TFS so as your needs grow you can reconfigure it to add more capabilities.

It’s a really exciting development and I hope you really like it.  I encourage you to get TFS 2010 Beta 2 when it is available later this fall and give it a try.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Being Part of Team System 2010 Feature History

Today, is my first day at TechEd Berlin, 2009. despite of starting two days ago, i couldn’t come earlier due to some work commitments. Actually I decided to come to TechEd this year even if I am late due to My Commitment to the Team System Ask The Expert Booth, and I got my Prize for that once i got in :)

Once I got to the Booth which was the first thing to do once i got to the Event, I met The great Brian Harry again along With Stefanie Saad the TFS Group Program Manager. Stefanie told me that they Kept the MSF Agile Template with a new version (5.0) into the 2010 release of the TFS. She told me that one of the major drivers for this was my continuous efforts of convincing the product team that MSF agile Template is a crucial part for lots of companies.

This means that my efforts has succeeded to keep MSF Agile Template, and now i am part of the history of this release Which is really something i will be proud of always.

Actually, 12 months ago, the product team was thinking of removing this template from the TFS but, I tried to work hard and keep the communication always opened trying to convince them that this is a very harmful action to the Team System.

Because of the fact that Microsoft is a customer Oriented SW producer, they heard my concern with passion finally, decided to keep it based on lengthy exercise that made them sure of my Opinion. Everyday i work with Microsoft people I became more sure that the voice of customer and the benefit of customer is the major concern at all Microsoft Decision that always driven by voices of the Market. Thank you Brian, thank you Stefanie, Thank you Team System, and Thank you Microsoft :)