Buck Hodges
Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS and Team Foundation Server)
Latest posts
Azure SDK 1.8 now available for build in Team Foundation Service
Brian wrote a post today about the version control web experience changes that were in today’s update. Today’s update also included Azure SDK 1.8 on the build VMs. I’ve seen quite a few folks asking for it, of course. One of the questions we get often is why we don’t have X in the build VMs. Some of Brian’s post today touches on that, mostly in the form of the explanation for our lack of support for building Win8 apps. The other issue we have is keeping up with the new releases of SDKs of all sorts. For a few, like the Windows Phone 8 SDK, we’ll time updates of the build VMs t...
Doc on unattended configuration of TFS 2012
TFS 2012 (RTM and newer) added a new tfsconfigure unattend command that supports unattended configuration of the server, build proxy, and SharePoint extensions. There’s now a new whitepaper available that explains it. While the paper is titled Unattended Installation of TFS 2012, it’s really unattended configuration. Unattended Installation of TFS 2012 Introduction Unattended install is a feature of Team Foundation Server that lets a user pre-set all configuration parameters for a desired TFS instance in advance. This allows TFS to be configured from start to finish without pausing for input f...
November power tools release for TFS 2012
Today we published a new release of the power tools for TFS 2012 Update 1. This includes important fixes for the backup/restore power tool to be compatible with the release of TFS 2012 Update 1. We did a lot of refactoring of the server DLLs for the cloud service, http://tfs.visualstudio.com, and we needed to update the backup/restore power tool in particular as a result. The one new thing we added in this release is x64 support for the PowerShell scripts. Beyond that, we fixed a number of bugs, most notably performance issues for the team members feature. Download power tools for TFS 2012 Update 1 If you nee...
TFS 2012 Update 1 Issue: Error while configuring build
[Update 2/1/13] A fix for the issues is now available. [Update 1/14/13] See this post for the latest on a fix with attaching collections. --- We’ve discovered an issue in TFS Update 1 that may result in errors when you try to configure a build agent or controller. You will see an error in the Build Service Configuration Wizard (configuring a new agent/controller) or in the TFS Administration Console (viewing the properties of a build controller/agent). In the event log on the server, you’d find an error about the database not being configured correctly. TF53010: The following error has occurre...
TFS and VS 2012 Update 1 now available
[Update 2/1/13] A fix for the issues is now available. [Update 1/14/13] See this post for the latest on issues with attaching a collection. As announced on Soma’s blog, Update 1 for Visual Studio and Team Foundation Server 2012 is now available. Over at the ALM blog, you can find more details on what’s new. For those using the Team Foundation Service at tfs.visualstudio.com, you are already familiar with the new features, as we update the service every three weeks. In addition to fixing bugs that were discovered after RTM, here are the new Features in Team Foundation Server in Visual Studio 2012 Update 1, whic...
New tool to upgrade from Visual SourceSafe to Team Foundation Server or Service
Today we have released an upgrade tool for users of VSS to upgrade to either on-premises TFS or the Team Foundation Service in the cloud! It provides a wizard-based UI for upgrading a VSS repository to TFS 2010, 2012, or the service. Compared to the old VSS conversion experience, there are quite a few improvements. With mainstream support having ended back in July for VSS 2005, now is a great time to move. You can download it now and find the documentation here. [UPDATE 11/14/12] We will be changing the docs to indicate that you are not required to have an empty team project collection or team p...
Windows Phone SDK now available in Build for Team Foundation Service
Brian mentioned this in a blog post last week, but I think it may have gotten lost in everything else that was going on. The Team Foundation Service’s build feature (i.e., build in the cloud) has the Windows Phone SDK installed on it now so that you can build you Windows Phone 8 (and 7) apps. The blocker here had been that the SDK could not be installed on the VMs we use because they run Windows Server 2008 R2, and that was fixed with the SDK released last week.Follow me on Twitter at twitter.com/tfsbuck
Video from 2012 Build Conference: Evolution of TFS into a Service
This year at //build/ conference I gave a presentation on the evolution of Team Foundation Server from a box product to a service that has a box product. It’s been a fun journey, and I enjoyed telling the story of what our team has accomplished over the last couple of years. I start with the beginning of the 2012 cycle and go over the changes we’ve made to our process and engineering system to be able to ship every three weeks. Along the way I answer questions from the audience and wrap up with some of the lessons we’ve learned. I hope you enjoy it. Developing Continuous Services: Real world ...
DevDiv is now running on TFS 2012 Update 1 final CTP
Back in June, I wrote about the upgrade of the main Developer Division server to TFS 2012 RC. That post described both the scale of that server as well as the issues that we found in the process of upgrading it and the for the first week of running it (we found most all of the issues in the first week). Last month we upgraded that server to TFS 2012 RTM. Now this past Friday, we upgraded it to the final CTP for TFS 2012 Update 1. While the CTP is not licensed for production use, we wanted to use this opportunity to find the issues that you only find in production on such a large server. We’ve been upgradin...