Do I need VS installed in order to connect to TFS?
If I'll download ONLY Team Explorer without VS, will I get some UI (similar the one I get in VS) to connect to TFS?
Team explorer installs a Visual Studio shell, so you get the same GUI as if you had VS installed. In addition you get tf.exe which allows you to do all source control functions from the command line.
No, you do not need VS to connect to TFS. TFS also provides web based interface to manage TFS.
Once Team Explorer is installed, you get access to the TF.EXE command line tool, but also worth looking at the TFS Power Toys for the tftp.exe command line tool and the PowerShell Snapin for more command line operation.
Related
We use Team Foundation Version Control(TFVC) on on-prem TFS server. For quite a while it was possible to use TFS Power Tools (tfpt tool) from Visual Studio Developer Command Prompt. Lately we moved to VS 2019. Problem is that we can't find any proper TFS Power Tools for VS 2019. For example to do undo checkout of unmodified files.
Does anyone had similar problem not being able to use tftp tools from VS 2019?
Does anyone had similar problem not being able to use tftp tools from VS 2019?
Sorry for any inconvenience.
This is a know issue about Visual Studio 2019. The Team Foundation Server Power Tools currently only updated to TFS2017, TFS2019 is not yet available.
Besides, Power tool has been renamed TFS Process Template Editor: TFS Process Template Editor
Edit: As of 10/16/2020 there is a TFS Template Editor for Visual Studio 2019
MS engineers are trying to develop it and will release it so that you can use it as soon as possible.
If you want to modify the work items, you can modify the work items by referring to the following documents:
Import, export, and manage work item types
Hope this helps.
For undoing unmodified files changes you can use this extension https://stackoverflow.com/a/52839174/6300406
I worked for year using CVS source control with Windows Explorer integration using TortoiseCVS which enabled me to view the history of my files in a graphical way and allow me to compare any 2 versions of the file without the need to open IDEs.
Lately I started working in a new place that uses TFS which require me to open Visual Studio every time I want to see the file history.
It would be great to have this level of integration between TFS and Windows Explorer. I wonder if any third party has developed such functionality?
Currently I use C# with Visual Studio 2013.
This is what I see when I choose Revision Graph:
Shell integration can be installed as part of the Visual Studio Power Tools for Team Foundation Server 2013. Make sure you check the "Windows Shell Extensions" option.
To see the revision graph, I am afraid you still need to open Visual Studio and use the Track Changeset feature which seems the closest as far as I can tell.
That and the "Incoming Changes" codelens that was added to Visual Studio 2013 Ultimate and which is going to be part of Visual Studio 2015 Professional and up.
How can I access files held in TFS source control without installation of Visual Studio?
You can check out the Team Explorer Everywhere as an alternative way to get at your Team Foundation source code.
The actual source code is stored in a SQL Server database that the Team Foundation Server installs.
On Windows, the Team Explorer installation (included with the TFS install) will install enough of Visual Studio to access TFS. It also installs the command line tool (tf.exe) which can be used to perform most operations without needing to start Visual Studio.
Installing the TFS PowerToys will optionally add a PowerSehll module that includes cmdlets for most version control operations, and integrates nicely into PowerShell.
On other OSs look at Team Explorer Everywhere (as marc_s has already answered).
Is it possible to get a standalone TFS client on a server that does NOT have Visual Studio installed? We'd like a way to "reach into" a TFS project from a server, without having to install Visual Studio?
Possible? I've seen Team Explorer, but will that work without Visual Studio?
Team Explorer 2008 will allow you to connect to TFS, but it will install a Visual Studio shell.
Team Explorer Everywhere has Web access. Martin Woodward wrote a great article about it.
Download the TFS power tools. The "Windows Shell Extension" component allows one to perform most operations with TFS via Windows Explorer. Note that the Power Tools installer states that Visual Studio 2010 (or Visual Studio Team Explorer 2010) is a prerequisite for the following features:
Command-line interface
Visual Studio Integration
Check-in Policy Pack
Process Editor
Windows Shell Extension
PowerShell Cmdlets
It's 2017 and Microsoft (re)introduced the standalone Team Explorer.
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/visualstudioalm/2017/04/05/reintroducing-the-team-explorer-standalone-installer/
If you remember back to 2013 (and before), we released standalone installers for Team Explorer. In VS 2015, we did not release a standalone Team Explorer since customers had free options with Express SKUs and Community, which included Team Explorer functionality.
Customers have continued to request a standalone installer for Team Explorer for non-developers, however. And so today, with the Visual Studio 2017 Update release, the standalone Team Explorer installer is back.
Download - https://www.visualstudio.com/thank-you-downloading-visual-studio/?sku=TeamExplorer&rel=15
Included with Team Foundation Server there is a free web front end called "TFS Web Access". In TFS 2008, the Web Access was a different installation and it came as a Power Tool to the TFS. In TFS 2010, the Web Access is installed automatically and is part of the TFS.
In order to get to the Web Access in TFS 2010 do the following:
In your preferred browser type:
http://[YourServerName]:8080/tfs/web/
YourServerName is the tfs name for example: http://tfs-srv:8080/tfs/web/
Also, if you need Agile planning and a Task Board with TFS Web Access, take a look at Urban Turtle - http://urbanturtle.com. According to Microsoft, this is the premier Scrum tooling for TFS.
Discloser: I work with the Urban Turtle team. So do not take my words. Instead, read what Microsoft blogs said about Urban Turtle.
http://blogs.msdn.com/search/SearchResults.aspx?q=urban%20turtle§ions=3652.
There now seems to be a more generic Team Explorer Everywhere for TFS - perhaps that will give us non-VS users desktop access to TFS :)
It includes an Eclipse plug-in and usefully, a command line client.
While it appears to be a dead project. If you like having version control outside an IDE (or independant of the IDE). There is SVN Bridge, which allows you to use TortoiseSVN to talk to your TFS server.
https://svnbridge.codeplex.com/
You can install Team Explorer (on the TFS install DVD, or you can download it from MSDN) without needing to have VS2010 installed - Team Explorer will install a 'shell' VS2010 with only the TFS features available - none of the IDE components.
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=fe4f9904-0480-4c9d-a264-02fedd78ab38
Does anyone know how you can install/run the TFS Team Explorer in stand alone mode when Visual Studio 2008 is installed on the same machine?
Additional Information: I should have been a little more clear in my question. I'm trying to access the Work Items.
The TFS Team Explorer will always integrate with a version of Visual Studio (apart from Express) if it is installed and there is no way of running it stand-alone.
If you install the TFS 2008 Power Tools, then you can have it so that you get Windows Explorer integration for TFS which many people enjoy. You might also want to look at Team System Web Access to provide a mechanism for accessing TFS from just a web browser (but obviously doesn't include full version control capabilities)
Finally, the company I work for has a completely standalone TFS client called Teamprise Explorer that is implemented in Java, however this is a commercial product.
Hope that helps,
Martin.
The answer is that there really isn't a standalone version. When you install VS Team Explorer on a machine without Visual Studio, the installer will install a Visual Studio shell. Then, when you run Team Explorer in standalone mode, you are actually running a Visual Studio shell.
Martin had a good point about Team System Web Access, which probably would do the job nicely. Plus it has the added benefit that it allows non Visual Studio users access to work items. But, it was decided that it was too much trouble to get permission to install it here (working for the US Army can have its issues).
My solution for now is to run another instance of Visual Studio and access the Team Explorer tools from there.