I’ve gotten TFS installed, now I need to install Visual Studio Team System 2010 Beta 1.
Here is the standard splash screen we all know and love, updated for 2010 Beta 1, of course:
I clicked the Install Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 link. And I have the slow wait while a bunch of files are copied to the temp directory. I’m pretty sure the slowness is due to my VPC though.
Here is the intro window of the install:
Next, as usual, is the EULA.
Oooh, this is new. On the next screen, you have two checkboxes:
You can click the Customize button to view the detailed product features to add and delete. I stuck with the two checkboxes, and clicked the Install button. And, of course, here is what you hope to see when you are done:
Ok, so my installation of VSTS 2010 Beta 1 was successful. WooT!
Currently with Beta 1 there is no documentation to install (it is available online though).
I’ve shut down my VPC and merged the UNDO disk changes, so I now have a VSTS 2010 Beta 1 environment ready to go.
Time to start delving in…
Once the installation has finished running, you’ll see the following:
Notice the checkbox “Launch Team Foundation Server Configuration Tool”. It has been documented already on the web that if you don’t run the configuration immediately after install, there are some issues with the Beta. I’m going to leave that box checked and click the Finish button.
The Team Foundation Server Configuration tool kicks off:
The Default Configuration option works for me. It is the one to use if you are deploying TFS to a single server, want Sharepoint installed and configured for you, and you want to use the default instance of SQL Server (all of which apply to me). I selected Default Configuration and clicked the Start Wizard button.
Here is the first page of the wizard:
Click the Next button, and you will be prompted to enter your service account:
Click the Next button to review your configuration. You can scroll down through the list to see how all the different elements of TFS will be configured:
Click the Next button to move on to the Readiness Checks section, which will validate that the system is ready to be configured:
Looks like my machine is ready to go. I click the Configure button, and then sit back and watch the configuration happen.
If everything goes well, you’ll see this:
The final windows of the configuration wizard gives you a link to a detailed log file about the configuration session:
Up next, configuring Team Build 2010.
To start off, I downloaded the latest version of the installation guide for Team Foundation Server 2010 Beta 1.
I then created a new base Virtual PC image, using Windows 2008 Standard Edition.
I copied the base machine, renamed the VHD file, and am using it for the rest of my install, so that I still have my clean Win2008 machine for other uses. I know I could have just based my new machine off the old VHD file, but disk space is cheap, so I’m not too worried about that.
Fired up the new VPC. Created the following users:
Installed IIS 7.0, following the instructions in the installation guide for Windows Server 2008.
Installed SQL Server 2008 Enterprise Edition, following the instructions in the installation guide for Windows Server 2008.
Added the TFSREPORTS account to the Database Engine, per the instructions in the installation guide.
Verified SQL Server 2008 was installed successfully, per the instructions in the installation guide.
Ok, now with all the prereqs out of the way, I can get on to the business of installing Team Foundation Server 2010 Beta 1.
Remember the good ole days of installing TFS 2005? Well, if you do, you’ll be much happier with the TFS 2010 install.
When I popped in the media, it prompted me to view the files on the DVD.
You now have the option of doing a x86 or a x64 install of TFS. That’s right, TFS 2010 supports 64-bit now.
I navigated into the x86 directory and ran the setup executable. I’m doing this install in a VPC, so I expect things to be slow, but the copying of the required resources to my temp directory seemed to take forever (around 20 minutes).
Once all the files are copied to the temp directory, the initial install screen opens:
I simply clicked the Next button. The next screen shows the EULA and what components are going to be installed:
Again, I simply clicked the Next button. The final screen allows you to select which Team Foundation Server components you want to install.
In my case, I want to install both Team Foundation Server and the Build service on this machine, so I select both of them. Click the Install button, and the install takes off.
Argh, it did make me reboot after installing the .NET Framework, but before installing TFS.
Wait though, you might ask, what about those three accounts you set up. I didn’t see you do anything with them.
That my friends, will wait for the next post. Let’s just say, just because I’m running the install, doesn’t mean I’m done with the configuration….
My session at Tech Ed 2009 was on Practical Web Testing with Visual Studio Team System 2008. Overall, I feel like the session went very well. We covered all the different aspects of web testing with VSTS 2008, and even had a sneak peak at what was coming with VSTS 2010.
If you attended Tech Ed 2009, then you can view the video online here. At this point, I don’t know the options for viewing the session if you were not an attendee. I’m checking on that now, and I’ll let you know once I find something out.
Here are some of the comments from the reviews of my session:
“Excellent presentation. This is the type of presentation I come to TechEd and PDC to see.”
“Speaker did a good job of presenting the information in an engaging manner.”
“Very good presentation. Mickey did a great job of explaining tools and features of Visual Studio that I heard about, but never actually ever used. Now I am excited to return to work and put some of those techniques to use.”
I had a great time this year, getting to present again, working the Learning Center area, catching up with friends, and getting to talk with attendees. Special thanks to William Salazar, Ed Holloway and Gregg Boer for all the great conversation at the booth during booth duty.
Ok, I’m in the speaker room at Tech Ed 2009 right now, working on my presentation. Still have a demo I’m having problems with, so keep your fingers crossed.
I’ll be down in the TLC working the booths from 11-3 today (Monday), so come by and say hi!
I’m going for the tri-fecta again this year(getting recognized for Team System Rocks, my book, and Radio TFS). Help me out!
Ok, here is my slightly-revamped outline for my Tech Ed 2009 talk on “Practical Web Testing”. As usual, feedback is appreciated. I’m planning to nail the outline down this week, and then begin creation of the demos. As I start creating the demos I’ll screencast them, to get some more feedback. Astute readers will catch a couple of changes to the outline, based on feedback I have already received:
Possible .NET 3.5 Web Site Starter Kits To Use For Demo
- Introduction - 2 minutes
- Section Purpose: To introduce me, the session topic and set the expectations for the session.
- Web Testing - The Past - 5 minutes
- Section Purpose: To talk about how I (and other people) have done web testing in the past, the past being pre-VSTS2005.
- So for this we are talking about web testing pre VS2005, so VS2003, Visual Interdev 6, Notepad (wait, some people still use Notepad). Classic ASP and html pages
- Some tools that were available included nUnit, nUnit ASP (http://nunitasp.sourceforge.net/). These tools were free, but didn't really do "web testing". They were more for unit testing your classes and such.
- There were third-party tools out there that, but they were prohibitively expensive (at least for the companies that I worked for). Compuware, AutomatedQA
- So, how I did "web testing" - Wrote stuff out to the web page and/or to a log file, so I knew what was happening where. Obviously not the best way to do things. (Response.Write)
- Code was integrated into the page itself. No code-behind model
- With no built in tools, no external tools, and major restrictions on what open source tools I could use, I just didn't have a lot of options for testing other than this.
- Web/Load Testing - The Present - 50 minutes
- Section Purpose: To talk about how to use the web and load testing tools of VSTS 2005/2008. VSTS 2008 will be used for the demos, with the appropriate comments regarding backward compatability with VSTS 2005.
- VS2005/2008 brought web testing and load testing integration directly into Visual Studio
- Web Testing i2008 n VSTS 2005/allows you to test that your application works. It's not really designed for UI testing, though you can achieve that some. Its more designed to make sure your application is working correctly, and to integrate with load testing.
- Web Testing Demo Ideas
- Create a web test
- Break the web test into pieces
- Make the web test data driven
- Create a custom validation rule
- Make the web server a parameter and data drive multiple servers to test against. (Tiago Pascoal Idea)
- Run our web tests authenticating as a different user
- Talk about web test plugins and coded web tests
- Run a web test from the command line, showing how you can pass in a web server as a parameter to the test.
- Show how web testing can be involved as part of a CI Build process
- Create a build where you pass in the web server as a build parameter, which is then used by the web test (Hakan Forss idea)
- This will require building a custom build task to do this (the custom build task will be pre-built to allow the demo to fit in the time alloted)
- Load Testing allows a tester to perform a load test against the web application directly from their machine. You also have the ability to use load agents to link multiple machines together to perform major load testing.
- Load Test Demo
- Create a load test of a simple web page that doesn't use caching
- Enable caching
- Rerun the load test. The test should show different results
- Web/Load Testing - The Future - 15 minutes
- Section Purpose: To talk about the future enhancements to web and load testing that will come with VSTS 2010. Specifically, the demo will cover Coded UI Testing.
- Ahh, the future. Everyone likes to dream about the future (think of the Jetsons)
- Not too much has changed with web testing
- Load Testing - excel report integration
- Coded UI Testing
- Now this is cool, and it works not just for web apps, but win forms and WPF as well
- With web apps, its actually going to run IE and click and do exactly what you do (instead of just sending requests directly to the server). So client-side javascript will be executed with the test.
- Coded UI Demo
- Create a coded UI web test
- Create validation rules to validate the web page
- Run the test and show how it actually steps through the web browser (as opposed to normal web testing, where the testing framework sends the requests directly to the server)
- Time permitting, delve into the files that make up the coded UI Test
- Conclusion and Q&A - 3 minutes
- Section Purpose: Wrap up everything that has been talked about for the past 75 minutes
- Let's take the Q&A to the Technical Learning Center! (TLC)
While listening to sessions at the MVP summit today, I’ve been trying to create a general outline for my Tech Ed presentation. My session is titled “Practical Web Testing”. Here is the abstract:
This session is about looking at the past, present, and future of web testing. We'll start by looking at how web testing was accomplished before the arrival of Visual Studio Team System. Next, we'll look at the web and load testing tools available in VSTS 2005/2008. And finally, we'll examine the future of web and load testing with a look at VSTS 2010
Here is the working outline that I currently have. I say “working” because this is a work in progress. I' will probably have changed it by this evening. But I’d love some feedback from the community. So email me or leave a comment.
Outline
I’ve been selected to present at Tech Ed 2009 North America again this year! (And there was much rejoicing). I am thrilled and excited to be invited back to speak again this year.
While preparing for my talk last year, I tried to open up my creation process, and solicit information from the community in making the presentation. That worked pretty nicely, so this time I’m going to try and open up the process even more.
My topic this year is “Practical Web Testing”. Here is the abstract:
This session is about looking at the past, present, and future of web testing. We'll start by looking at how web testing was accomplished before the arrival of Visual Studio Team System. Next, we'll look at the web and load testing tools available in VSTS 2005/2008. And finally, we'll examine the future of web and load testing with a look at VSTS 2010
Now I have some ideas for demos concerning the past, present and future concepts, but I’m really interested in the community’s perspective on this topic. What are your favorite tips or tricks for how you have done web testing in the past? How do you use web testing and load testing in VSTS 2005/2008 right now? Email me your suggestions, or leave them as a comment on this post. Make sure to leave your name (if you want), because any hints/comments that I use in the presentation I’ll credit to you!
My plan over the next 30 days is to create my presentation, and screen-record it for feedback. Based on feedback, I’ll refactor the presentation and go again. Like all good plans, this one is subject to change. But the one thing that won’t change is that I want to use community feedback, so give it to me. Let me know what you like and don’t like about the talk concept. Let me know if there is anything specifically that you would like covered.
My goal with all this is to deliver, with this presentation, the information that you, the community, are interested in hearing about. Help me make this goal a reality.
Notion Tools for Team System v1.0 was finally released on February 20th. We’re actively documenting requirements for v1.1, your ideas are welcome! You can download the software from the Notion Solutions website and follow the instructions to get it up and running with a trial key. In order to get it working, you do have to install the server software. While the server components make it harder to “try it out”, it was needed to facilitate some of the capabilities we implemented.
Check out the tools
- Notion Timesheet - time-tracking system that allows users to capture and record time against Team System Work Items directly from within Visual Studio.
- Notion Work Organizer - extends Visual Studio to enhance Team System with a better means of managing work items and their associated documentation and artifacts. Manages parent/child work items.
- Notion Work Planner - By taking an account of the expertise and productivity of each team member, teams can use estimates to develop more accurate iteration and release schedules.
- Notion Work Item Controls - contains custom work item controls that help teams visualize and maintain hierarchical relationships between work items in a Team Project.
Feedback is always appreciated! And don’t hesitate to ask if you have any questions.
Paul Hacker, a Team System MVP, just made me aware of a new Hosted TFS Service from SaaS Made Easy:
SaaS Made Easy, LLC is pleased to announce their Hosted TFS offering. With the lowest cost in the industry, SaaS Made Easy is able to bring this product to you at a competitive and affordable cost.
Hosted Team Foundation Server provides you a source control repository, branching merging, shelving and much more. You also get detailed reports so you have real-time progress on your project and integration with SharePoint, Office Excel and Project. Track the progress of your projects with a robust work item tracking system that is completely customizable to meet the needs of your team.
if this appeals to you, go to www.saasmadeeasy.com for more information.
Martin Woodward and I sat down with Tommy Norman to discuss Agile (and specifically Scrum) and Team Foundation Server. Tommy was great, and is very passionate about both agile development and how Team System can be used to foster a great agile development experience. We went into some details about using Scrum and Team System as well.
Go check it out!
So some great people, some of whom I know and some of whom I know by reputation, were “put back on the market today” (i.e. layed off). All of these people worked for Telligent (the creators of Community Server), which has a reputation for hiring high-quality staff. Unfortunately, Telligent is as much a victim of this market as everyone else lately, so they were forced to do a RIF (Reduction In Force).
Now you may or may not follow Twitter, but this has been storming around the Twitterverse.
So, right now, if you are looking for some high-quality programming and technical talent, it’s out there and available. Here is a list of all the people I was able to find. I’ve linked you to their Twitter page. If you have an opening, or are interested in talking to them, send them a message. Let’s see how many of these guys we can help out!
@djkrush
@lancehunt
@hkarthik
@jasona
@fallenrogue
@alexlowe
@TerriMorton
Let me know who isn’t on this list, and I’ll add them.
Want to contact me on Twitter? Here I am: @mickey_gousset
The company that I work for, Notion Solutions, has just announced a suite of extensions to Microsoft Visual Studio Team System. Here is an excerpt from the website:
These tools add new capabilities that help teams manage work better, plan schedules, visualize work relationships, manage requirements and requirements documents, record time, and more. The individual products that make up Notion Tools for Team System include:
There is a webcast scheduled for today (Thursday, February 5, 2009) at 3 PM CST to introduce these tools. If you are interested in attending, here is the link:
https://www.livemeeting.com/cc/notions/join?id=QRBM4K&role=attend&pw=j%7EG%2B6xn%40g
If you want to see what’s coming down the pipe for VSTS 2010, playing with the CTP is a great way to do that. Another option you have, though, is to read some of the specifications that have been released so far. You can find the specifications here.
While there aren’t a lot of them, there are some interesting ones. I’m really interested in the changes that are coming for Team Foundation Server, so i started off with the Enterprise Team Foundation Server Management spec. This is a 30+ page document that gives you a lot of good detail into what is coming. And I really like the style it is written in.
Some of the specs have been out there for a while, and I doubt we will see any more, since we now have the ability to play with the CTP. But they are definitely worth a glance.
You may need to configure a Team Build such that you can pass parameters into it, allowing you to dynamically change how the build works or what the build does. You have the ability to pass parameters into a Team Build when you queue up a new build definition to run.
Simply right-click on the build definition you want to run, and select Queue New Build. This will open the Queue Build <BuildDefinitionName> window.
At the bottom of the Queue Build window is a section titled MSBuild command-line arguments (optional). This is a multi-line textbox where you can enter MSBuild command line arguments. To pass parameters into your Team Build, using the /p parameter. Something like this:
/p:Parameter1=foo;Parameter2=bar
To access these parameters in your build script, you would use $(Parameter1) and $(Parameter2).
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