I assumed this would be easy, but I'm not finding anything on it...
I have a project in TFS 2010, which needs to be moved to a new TFS 2015 server. Apparently the project cannot simply be moved normally because it's using a different project template which is not compatible and causes errors when trying to migrate (so I'm told - I don't have any more details on this).
I'm looking for a way to bring over the changesets, keeping history, to the new server. I assumed there was some kind of "dump" where you could export the TFS changesets, then import them into the new server into an empty project - but I'm not finding that option.
TFS Integration is deprecated and apparently doesn't work for TFS2015, with no alternative listed.
I'm open to other creative options like temporarily exporting to a different version control system - for example, I've looked at SVNBridge, but I can't even get that working, let alone figure out if it would help here.
Is there a way to migrate all changesets for a given project and keep history, without migrating the entire project?
There is no default way to migrate changesets in TFS, you would need 3rd party tool, like OpsHub (some features are not free), to migrate the most commonly requested data. Check: http://www.opshub.com/products/opshub-visual-studio-migration-utility/
Or you may consider doing a upgrade from TFS 2010 to TFS 2015, which is a full data transfer. To understand factors that affect your upgrade's compexity, check the requirements and review the upgrade process.
Learn if a dry run makes sense for you, and weigh the benefits and the costs to perform a pre-production upgrade.
When you're ready to upgrade, minimize downtime with the TfsPreUpgrade tool - especially for very large TFS collection databases (> 1 TB). Follow these steps for how to upgrade TFS.
I want to do daily migration of TFS changes to a ClearCase system. I was going to try out TFS Integration tools but I can't get any of the toolset pieces to work. What are the requirements to run this app? I have VS 2010, TFS 2010 and Sharepoint 2010 installed. The assemblies it's trying to load don't seem to be present in VS2010 and I don't if it requires VS 2008 or not. Anyone ever had this running? I'm migrating from TFS to CC. Not the other way around.
Update:
I've been using this tool to sync TFS 2010 changes back into a UCM ClearCase implementation at the client. It has been going poorly. The tool should be clearly marked as Beta or even Alpha. A peek into the code reveal around 100 TODO's and "This needs to be fixed". I have spent a good deal of time trying to iron out some of the issues and have made progress. My suggestion is before using this tool on mission critical projects, spend at least 3-4 weeks evaluating it in your environment. When it works, it works pretty well with moving changes.
I don't know much about how to access TFS2010 elements, besides "check an individual project for pre & postbuild steps either by loading the project in visual studio or manually reading the project file".
If you need Sharepoint assembly, this technote describes the requirements.
And I don't think an automatic import utility exists (from TFS2010 to ClearCase 7.1.x), as this technote mentions:
Change request (RFE) RATLC01005874 had been submitted requesting a conversion utility to export source code from Microsoft Team Foundation Version Control (TFVC) to ClearCase;
however, the decision was made by Product Management to exclude the requested feature from future upgrades and releases due to the significant architectural changes required to implement the solution.
The right approach is to manage to list the content of relevant labels for a given scope, and make a clearfsimport into a ClearCase view, with a full label applied right after it.
You don't need TFS (server), VS or SharePoint installed. You will need a SQL server for the core platform. Then you will need the various assemblies for TFS, which you can get by installing the Team Explorer component (it's on the TFS install media).
We decided to go with the TFS Integration Platform. It allows us to sync TFS work items back into ClearCase when ever we want. It provides the level of integration we needed to keep the traceability. The TFS to CC integration is bleeding edge, but it works enough for what we need. (Syncing work items and user check ins.)
We are a mostly MS shop at work doing .NET LOB development. We also use MS Dynamics for our CRM app... all the devs are currently using VS/SQL Server 2008. We also use VSS, but everyone hates it at work and that is quickly on its way out.
We are begining our initiative for TDD implementation across the team (~dozen ppl). I've gotten TeamCity setup and have my first automated builds running succesfully using the 2008 sln builder and also using SVN that a co-worker had setup who is doing the source control analysis. When demoing to managament, I think they started to buy into my snake oil and threw out the suggestions of looking into TFS.
This threw a wrench in what I had planned for our TDD architecture; In a good way though, because I had always assumed that TFS was just too expensive and not worth it for our team (and i've seen the same in other shops i've worked at / know of). I do feel like MS is years behind in the TDD/CI area and that the third party products were probably much better and more mature... I still need to do a lot of research, but I figured I'd come here to see if anyone has actually used both systems.
I realize the TFS encompasses a lot more then just a build server... but I didn't want to make this too broad of a question at least on purpose. What are the practical pros/cons of using TFS/TFB instead of TeamCity - e.g. which benefits would we lose/gain? Has anyone here actually used both systems (TFS for TDD/CI and TeamCity/SVN) and can speak from practical standpoint?
I've done some searching on this topic, and one post I found here on SO mentioned that the cons of TFB was it only supported MSBuild. I was planning on using FinalBuilder with TeamCity; and it appears it also supports TFS as well...
Thanks for any advice
EDIT: Has anyone used TFS as their Build/CI server and can tell of success/failure stories?
We are a small development shop, and decided that Team Foundation Server carries too much overhead for us. We used to write custom MSBuild scripts to run from the command line, but after we discovered TeamCity, we moved our entire build process over to it.
We've found TeamCity to be easy to use and configure, and JetBrains provides excellent support and documentation. They are also on a much faster release and update cycle than Microsoft.
Their support for SVN source control is excellent, and we like the fact that they support both MSTest and NUnit for unit testing.
We also liked the fact that the TeamCity Professional edition was free, so we could evaluate it to see if it worked for us. We haven't hit the number of project configurations (20) that would require us to upgrade to the Enterprise edition.
This question has a lot of good answers about TeamCity. It does not compare to TFS but it might shed some light on TeamCity for you.
I have used both, and I have had success with both, but TeamCity was so much easier. TeamCity was a breeze to set up and configure. TFS was not. TeamCity is rock solid, it's easy to maintain and it just plain works. The developers at JetBrains have done a great job responding to the community. They get a release out every 6 to 8 months that adds real value. TFS is on a 2 year or more cycle.
TeamCity gives you more choice in how you build and what source control you use. It's not all in one, but that's sometimes a good thing. It's got a good set of extension points as well. We have also been really happy with the agent model it has.
I've gone through 3 absolutely painles upgrades in TeamCity. The one TFS upgrade we did took our build and source control down for 3 days. I'm the admin for TeamCity on our project and it takes up a couple of hours a month. TFS took a couple of days a week.
TeamCity + SVN + VisualSVN has been the smoothest environment I have ever worked in. TFS was generally smooth on the day to day, but only if someone was there keeping it running.
Hope that helps
The benefits of TFS are one integrated environment that is supported by Microsoft. I personally do not like TFS for source control and have had a number of issues with it. It is clunky, however it had the benefit of having VS integration (which is also available in VisualSVN, but is not as robust).
Personally, I think you would be much better off using SVN/TeamCity. It is just easier to work with and behaves more as you would expect. As with most open source software, both are constantly evolving and will always have the latest and greatest feature before Microsoft. The integration between the 2 is really good and I have found no fatal flaws in the system. I constantly push to go this route in my current company (we use TFS), as I believe it is a much better workflow. As an added benefit, it is significantly cheaper than going the TFS route.
I have also used FinalBuilder with TFS - my question there is what are you really buying with FinalBuilder that you can't do with NANT/MSBuild? The answer at my shop is unfortunately very little IMO.
First off, see this post:
SVN vs. Team Foundation Server
As to your question about which environment better fosters TDD and such, my two cents is that the build management system matters much less than what's in the build file itself. Your Ant or MSBuild file should have the targets that do your testing. With MSBuild or Ant, you don't have to use MS's test suite. You can still use nUnit or whatever else you want. That means it doesn't matter if TFS is calling your MSBuild file, or if CruiseControl is, or if TeamCity is. The smarts are all in the build file and the tools you integrate with it.
My personal choice is not to get locked down into TFS's way of doing things, since you have a lot more freedom for a lot less cost with the wealth open-source testing tools that are out there. TFS is about to receive a major upgrade, as well. If you are going to go with TFS, my advice is to at least wait until 2010 is released. Concentrate on making your MSBuild files as good as they can be right now.
That being said, I must admit that TFS has one of the nicest build systems out there (2005 was terrible, 2008 was nice). Being able to easily customize notifications and the release process all inside .NET code was pretty cool -- you had a lot more central control over build and release policy than we did with CruiseControl.NET.
So I've used TFS and SVN/CCNet. I can't speak much to TeamCity. But IMO a build management system should be fairly agnostic to what is being built and how it's being built. For us, the extra control in the release management process that TFS brought us just wasn't enough of a bonus for us to justify the greatly increased administrative effort of a fully integrated TFS solution. Nor was it enough to justify the extra per-license cost of TFS, which can be significant.
The old TFS Build was XAML based and very cumbersome and and not nice to work with. That said, the new TFS 2015 build system is leaps and bounds better, and is script based with lots of web hooks and 3rd party integrations; very similar to Team City. Also, TFS now supports Git, so you are no longer confined to using Team Foundation Version Control (TFVC). Also, with TFS you can use your own on-prem installation, or can take advantage of a hosted solution through visualstudio.com. TFS is great because it's one completely integrated environment (work items, planning, builds, tests, deployments), whereas Team City is just a build solution. When this question was originally asked in 2010 I would've recommended Team City hands down. Now though, the 2 are very competitive. I would say that it would maybe boil down to if you want an all-in-one solution, then go with TFS, but if you are looking for purely just a build system, then Team City.
Comparing TeamCity to Visual Studio Team Services (the latest cloud-based offering from Microsoft):
Both work great for implementing a continuous integration process
TeamCity is more mature and everything just works.
Visual Studio Team Services by contrast is constantly evolving to catch up with TeamCity and some things just don't work well (e.g. try triggering builds based on paths that have changes from Git - the documentation is weak and the feature itself just doesn't work (as of August 2016))
Visual Studio Team Services makes it easy to have only cloud-based agents running your build (the downside however is that each has to do a clean pull of your repository for each build which may add a minute or more to the build). Both can also support local build agents which do not need to wipe the working directory for each fresh build.
But in either case I would highly recommend you also look at CakeBuild which moves most of the configuration information about how to do a build out of the CI system and into C# code that is in your Git repository along with all your other source code. With CakeBuild you can run the same build locally as you will run in the CI system and if you need to go back a month to build a specific version you have the source code and the build script to do it.
With CakeBuild in place you are now free to easily switch between TeamCity and Visual Studio Team Services.
The only downside to CakeBuild is that all your build steps are bundled into a single task in the CI system which makes reporting slightly less nice and may involve some extra work to get the test results out into a format that the CI reporting system can use.
MS is years behind in the TDD/CI area
Being one who has TDD'd for 4 years now you are correct. MS is still not even promoting it nor do they offer tools that work well with the TDD flow.
Don't get stuck dealing with Visual Studio for any kind of automation, source control, or agile workflow period (stop using TFS please!!). That stuff even though they say is "new" is monolithic and always comes with weird issues and bloat. It is always painful.
I've used Team City and it's simply amazing, things work, it's designed for usability, and it's simply designed well and compatible with most all test tools, etc. Fine use Visual Studio for code, nothing else. Look for external and open source tools to help build a better CI. The "you can do everything right in VS" sell is not selling, and it's not working. People nowdays are used to and always combining different tools from the outside to get things done. Relying on all MS toolsets is just not the way to go IMO for .NET. MS likes to sell "hey you can just do everything right here". But you end up with nothing but pain when you go that route and drink their koolade (TFS, MS Fakes, etc.).
If you plan on doing TDD, you definitely don't want to be using all MS tools. You'll either be pushed down "their way" of doing things which is often proprietary and/or bloated when you try to TDD with their tools or be totally restrictive. For TDD you need to be able to have some flexibility and choices when you decide to layer in different test frameworks, assertion libraries, etc.
Add Octopus on top of Team City, and it's stellar...you will simply fall in love with it as developer or for anyone doing DevOps.
Stop trying to rely on Microsofts continued failure at agile tool offerings
Start looking outside the box and try new things is what I keep repeating to the .NET world, me being a .NET developer in the past and who has tried new things outside the MS world.
We've planned to move from Visual SourceSafe to TFS. For this purpose, we brought a new server machine with updated specs and TFS installed. The Visual SourceSafe machine still has its use in the environment as the TFS machine dedicated for a single project.
All the projects are there in Visual SourceSafe machine and are being managed since more than half decade. As I said there will be only one project which is going to be moved on TFS machine. What we required here is a complete and safe image of VSS Working Directory of the project in TFS machine because to Migrate from VSS to TFS you would have to installed Visual SourceSafe there on TFS machine.
What is the best practice to move your
VSS Working Directory (project) from
machine-to-machine. Is there a way to
avoid this step and we could directly
move VSS Working Directory to TFS?
Once the project working directory setup on TFS machine, we can use VSSConverter.exe utility to migrate from VSS to TFS. There is an GUI version of VSSConverter.exe utility which makes this more easier than doing this through command prompt.
A Team Project is successfully created with MSF for Agile Software Development on TFS machine. There was an issue in the beginning trying to create the Team Project which seems SharePoint services were unable to start. Finally, we ended up on some blog who mentioned if you installed SharePoint Services after TFS then you have to check the SharePoint Central Administration Services and change its port to default 17012.
This is what we could have done on TFS. Not sure, are we on the right route or not? The ask is not big move a single project from Visual SourceSafe which is an independent machine to TFS machine. But, it is because we all are new on TFS.
The expenses already made, a new server machine, Windows 2008 Server R2, and TFS which let no choice for us except learn and do it. I hope this will become a good experience all in the end but to make it good we have to put more efforts and build attitude to get through this.
I will be thankful if you guys could suggest us on this circumstances how should we plan and collaborate. The best can be this, all this transaction will not affect our productivity on project. We could deliver and managed our deadlines along with this showdown.
Thanks.
Have a Good Day!
POINT 1: It sounds like you have already had someone recommend that you migrate all your projects at one time. The reason they recommended it is because it is generally a good idea. If I were you, I would take a second look at migrating all the projects and using switching everyone to the MSSCCI provider for TFS. This will essentially let everyone continue to work just like they do now and with the same tools they use now but the code will be in TFS.
POINT 2: Spend a little time to make sure you want to use the MSF Agile process template. Not because there is anything wrong it with MSF (it's great!) but because it is hard to change templates once you get started. This is the time you want to do a little thinking about software process improvement and how you want the office workflow to function once you are all using the full Team Explorer client. My shop has been using the Scrum for Team System template and we love it. It is especially cool when you add on the Scrum Dashboard web site and the Scrum Sprint Monitor on a publicly visible screen.
Our team is migrating from VSS 6.0 to TFS 2008 to be used for source control purposes. I am wondering if anyone has any experience with this migration. In particular, we are interested in preserving the history of files in source control, as well as any other potential gotchas.
Do you have VSS 2005 installed? You need it rather than the previous version (6.0d).
Also, do you really need the history in TFS? Or can you draw a line in the sand and say that all history before such and such a date is in VSS and all history after that date is in TFS? If so, you can simply do a get latest from VSS and add the files into TFS. Migrating is non-trivial because you need to deal with VSS users that don't map to domain users, VSS users that don't exist anymore, and although the order of source-control operations is maintained the actual date/time of the operation isn't migrated, it is however stored in the comment as part of the migration.
This is fairly easy once setup. You will first need to create a usermap.xml. This will map your VSS users to your TFS2008 users. Then you create a project configuration file. I would post examples of mine but I can't get the XML to post.
The project configuration file will point to the usermap XML file. Then all you have to do is type the command "VSSConverter migrate settings.xml" to migrate or "VSSConverter analyze settings.xml" to analyze the project. I suggest you to analze before migrating the project.
Here is a link for more information.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms253090(VS.80).aspx
Unfortunately, when I tried this...
TF60032: The VSS Converter requires Visual SourceSafe 2005 or later to run.
Please install Visual SourceSafe 2005 or later and try again.