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Home > Cloud & Networking > Servers > Team Foundation Server 2015 Customization
Team Foundation Server 2015 Customization
Team Foundation Server 2015 Customization

Team Foundation Server 2015 Customization: Take your expertise to the next level by unraveling various techniques to customize TFS 2015

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Team Foundation Server 2015 Customization

Chapter 2. Streamlining Your Teams' Boards

In this chapter, we will cover the many ways in which you can customize TFS team boards. Team boards include Kanban boards, which are for portfolio-level work items (such as Epic, Feature, and Requirement), and Task boards, which are slightly less configurable at the moment, but we'll outline them as we go. With respect to these boards, we'll cover the configuration of:

  • Cards
  • Swimlanes
  • Columns

Again, this chapter will also assume that you have all the permissions required to edit the configuration for a team as needed in the chapter examples.

Teams in TFS

Before getting started, it's worth knowing what teams in TFS are and how they are configured, as all the board settings are configured per team. Each team project in TFS is configured with a single team at its creation, named <Team Project Name> team. From the Overview tab under the team project settings, you can add more teams by clicking on New team, as shown here:

Teams in TFS

Figure 1: Team project settings

Once you have added new teams, they will appear under the team project in the BROWSE SERVER dialog, like this:

Teams in TFS

Figure 2: Newly created teams showing up in the BROWSE SERVER dialog

When you navigate to one of these projects, they will show up in the TFS web client header, as highlighted here:

Teams in TFS

Figure 3: The TFS web client selected team

Each team has its own board settings and its own pinned items for the dashboard, making it very easy and convenient to follow the common practice called "One Team Project to rule them all" (http://nakedalm.com/one-team-project/).

Where do I find the board settings?

If you are looking to navigate to the requirements board, you can click on the Board link from the team home page, or click on the Task board link to go to the team's current task board, as shown here:

Where do I find the board settings?

Figure 4: The Board link from the homepage

For now, let's go to the Requirements board. When you have navigated there, you will notice that in the top-right corner there is a settings cog icon, as shown in the following screenshot. Click on it.

Where do I find the board settings?

Figure 5: The settings icon on the board page

Next, you will notice that you are given three options:

  • Columns
  • Swimlanes
  • Cards

If you navigate to the Task board and click on Settings, which is also found in the top-right corner, you will notice that you don't have the same options, as shown in this screenshot:

Where do I find the board settings?

Figure 6: The settings icon on the Task board

Now that you know where the settings are, let's dive into what they do.

Configuring card settings

The card's configuration settings are identical at the moment for both kinds of boards. In TFS 2013 without any supported way to perform card customizations, many people turned to Tiago Pascoal's Task Board Enhancer (http://pascoal.net/tag/task-board-enhancer/), which added a lot of great functionality to the boards with each version. In TFS 2015, many of these features are built in and hidden under the cards configuration. Clicking on the Cards option under the Settings icon will open the CUSTOMIZE CARDS dialog, which looks like this:

Configuring card settings

Figure 7: The CUSTOMIZE CARDS dialog

The first thing that you'll notice along the top of the dialog is each work item type that can be made visible on this board by the current process template configuration, with bug being a special case. This is because you are able to switch them from being on the requirements or the task board using a UI switch, which can be found under the Settings tab. This tab is under the Overview...

Show Effort

The next of the special configuration settings for cards is the Show Effort option. By default, this option is checked, as shown here:

Show Effort

Figure 13: The Show Effort setting

This option will show the effort on the work item. For tasks, this option is shown as Show Remaining Work. Talking about remaining work, it's also worth mentioning that the effort now has a similar edit experience on the board as the remaining hours did in TFS 2013.

Show Effort

Figure 14: The effort showing on the work item with a selectable drop-down list for effort

Previously, you would have to open the work item if you noticed that the effort was incorrect, which was slightly annoying, knowing how easy it was to adjust the remaining hours on the task board.

Show Tags

The last of the special field settings is for, in my opinion, one of the most powerful fields in TFS, which is the Show Tags option. The default here is unchecked, but I highly recommend switching this to checked if your team uses tags. If you don't...

Configuring swimlanes

A swimlane is a horizontal row added to your board to categorize specific work; for example, you can add a swimlane called expedite and place work items that are of top priority in that swimlane to visually group this higher priority work.

The next configurable bits are swimlanes. These are configurable on the Kanban board only, as it makes sense that certain tasks wouldn't go into an expedite lane; the entire requirement would move into that lane. Clicking on the Swimlanes option in the settings dropdown will show you the CUSTOMIZE SWIMLANES dialog, as shown in this screenshot:

Configuring swimlanes

Figure 19: The CUSTOMIZE SWIMLANES dialog

To add a new swimlane, click on the add Swimlane button, and you'll see the following screen:

Configuring swimlanes

Figure 20: Adding a new swimlane

Your lane will be added with a default name, which you can and should change. You'll also notice that you can click and drag the swimlanes to reorder them vertically, and then they will be displayed in that order on...

Teams in TFS

Before getting started, it's worth knowing what teams in TFS are and how they are configured, as all the board settings are configured per team. Each team project in TFS is configured with a single team at its creation, named <Team Project Name> team. From the Overview tab under the team project settings, you can add more teams by clicking on New team, as shown here:

Figure 1: Team project settings

Once you have added new teams, they will appear under the team project in the BROWSE SERVER dialog, like this:

Figure 2: Newly created teams showing up in the BROWSE SERVER dialog

When you navigate to one of these projects, they will show up in the TFS web client header, as highlighted here:

Figure 3: The TFS web client selected team

Each team has its own board settings and its own pinned items for the dashboard, making it very easy and convenient to follow the common practice called "One Team Project to rule them all" (http://nakedalm.com/one-team-project/).

Where do I find the board settings?

If you are looking to navigate to the requirements board, you can click on the Board link from the team home page, or click on the Task board link to go to the team's current task board, as shown here:

Figure 4: The Board link from the homepage

For now, let's go to the Requirements board. When you have navigated there, you will notice that in the top-right corner there is a settings cog icon, as shown in the following screenshot. Click on it.

Figure 5: The settings icon on the board page

Next, you will notice that you are given three options:

  • Columns

  • Swimlanes

  • Cards

If you navigate to the Task board and click on Settings, which is also found in the top-right corner, you will notice that you don't have the same options, as shown in this screenshot:

Figure 6: The settings icon on the Task board

Now that you know where the settings are, let's dive into what they do.

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Page 1 of 8

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Description

Team Foundation Server is an efficacious collaboration tools that will allow you to share code, track records, software, all in a single package. Integrate it with your existing IDE or editor and let your team work in a flexible environment that adapts to projects of all shapes and sizes. Explore what gives you the edge over other developers by knowing the tips and quick fixes of customizing TFS. Effectively minimize the time users spend interacting with TFS so that they can be more productive. In this book you will quickly cover lots of TFS extension points, from the very basic task of customizing and configuring dashboards to customizing automated builds and check-in policies. You will learn how to create dashboards in TFS 2015, as well as add tiles, graphs, and more useful modifications. You'll perform customizations that make TFS work for you by streamlining your team’s boards. You'll cast modifications to the process template and learn the tips and tricks required to make efficient and valuable uses of your team’s board. From team-specific dashboards to complex server plugins, everything is covered in this concentrated guide to aid your knowledge. Delving deep, this book covers the pros and cons of check-in policies, as well as their proper debugging and deployment strategies. After that you will learn about advanced XAML builds and TFS jobs to further experiment with the activities of your jobs on your system. Finally, you will learn about service hooks and the amazing utility of .VSO extensions to help you create new extensions and explore new levels of customization.

Who is this book for?

This book is intended for anyone with experience with TFS, and in particular, those intermediate users who want to add more value to their organization by making its TFS users more productive. The book requires basic coding skills.

What you will learn

  • Customize TFS 2015 dashboard and administer various components
  • Configure board cards, swim lanes, and columns
  • Explore the types of changes that can be made on the TFS process templates
  • Create your own custom control for the Web and client work item forms
  • Build up new checkin policies
  • Get to grips with your personal server plugins and their uses
  • Customize both XAML builds and the new build system
  • Schedule jobs for more complicated business rules to run on a schedule
  • Extend your TFS possibilities with service hooks and VSO extensions

Product Details

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Publication date : Oct 27, 2015
Length: 208 pages
Edition : 1st
Language : English
ISBN-13 : 9781785883217
Category :
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Concepts :
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Tools :
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Publication date : Oct 27, 2015
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Language : English
ISBN-13 : 9781785883217
Category :
Cloud & Networking
Concepts :
Servers
Tools :
Team Foundation Server

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Table of Contents

11 Chapters
1. Creating a Dashboard and a Welcome Page Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
1. Creating a Dashboard and a Welcome Page
What permissions do I need?
What is the Team Dashboard?
Pinning work item query data
Pinning recent code changes
Pinning the build status
Pinning testing charts
Rearranging tiles on the home page
Welcome pages
Summary
2. Streamlining Your Teams' Boards Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
2. Streamlining Your Teams' Boards
Teams in TFS
Where do I find the board settings?
Configuring card settings
Show Effort
Configuring swimlanes
Configuring columns
Summary
3. Customizing Your Process Template Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
3. Customizing Your Process Template
Some prerequisites
What is a process template?
How do I get started?
The process template structure
Importing a complete process template
Uploading changes after team project creation
Summary
4. Enhanced Work Item Forms with Field Custom Controls Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
4. Enhanced Work Item Forms with Field Custom Controls
Prerequisites
Using a custom control in the process template
Creating a Windows Forms Control for client applications
The project setup
Creating a web control for the web access
Summary
5. The Guide Standards for Check-in Policies Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
5. The Guide Standards for Check-in Policies
Prerequisites
The project setup
Implementation
Deploying a check-in policy
Configuring a check-in policy to be used
Deploying to the masses
Existing check-in policies
Summary
6. Enforcing Standards with Server-Side Plugins Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
6. Enforcing Standards with Server-Side Plugins
Check-in policies versus server plugins
The project setup
The basics of server plugin code
Deploying a server plugin
Debugging server plugins
A slightly more complicated example
Summary
7. Customizing the TFS Build Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
7. Customizing the TFS Build
The prerequisites
What is an XAML build template?
Should I use the old or the new build system?
How do I download a build template?
How do I create a new build?
Creating custom activities
How do I use a custom activity in a build template?
A walkthrough of the new build system
Summary
8. Creating TFS Scheduled Jobs Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
8. Creating TFS Scheduled Jobs
The project setup
Writing the TFS job
Deploying our TFS job
Registering, queueing, and deregistering a TFS job
How do I know whether my TFS job is running?
Summary
9. Service Hooks Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
9. Service Hooks
What service hooks are available?
Why would you want to use service hooks?
How can you use service hooks in TFS?
Completing and verifying the service hook works
Summary
10. VSO Extensions Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
10. VSO Extensions
What is VSO Extensions?
Why invest time in this extension model?
How do I build my own extension?
How can I stay up to date with VSO Extensions?
Summary
Index Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Index

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Item works as expected and delivered on-time.
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About the author

Profile icon Gordon Beeming
Gordon Beeming
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Gordon Beeming is an energetic and passionate person who always strives to find ways to increase and improve the productivity and friendliness of the systems he works with. He is currently a software developer and does all kinds of TFS administration, customization, and exploring as a sort of a hobby. He is part of the ALM Rangers family and has also been awarded an Microsoft ALM MVP for the past 2 years. Gordon currently works for Derivco, which is a very unique company to work for and is based in Durban, South Africa. He has a published book to his credit, called Team Foundation Server 2013 Customization (http://bit.ly/MX0yVb). Also, as part of the ALM Rangers, he has a book to his credit, called Managing Agile Open-Source Software Projects with Microsoft Visual Studio Online (http://bit.ly/1Pppi4g). You can find him mainly on Twitter using the handle @GordonBeeming, and he occasionally posts blogs at http://binary-stuff.com/.
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