blog
Migrating TFS to New Hardware
make sure both machines have the same version of tfs and have the same patches.
Example: We had our old version with sp1 and the new tfs only had RTM.
You will need to apply sp1 so no version conflicts occur with tfs_configuration.
Tags: continuous integration, Application lifecycle management, Release Management,
ALT.NET manage software teams 101 with SvnManager Post Create Script and Zend Framework
As a custom software development vendor in Dallas, Texas, we end up with several projects at a time. The faster we can build the team, and the various stages of development, the more responsive we can be to the client. These stages include creating the initial repository to centralize client code with correct security rights, and setting up the TeamCity build environment to push out to various environments for dev, test, staging, UAT, and production, Our automation scripts play a vital role in making our software shop successful, by removing headaches, improving response rates, freeing up time for vital members of the team, and providing consistency across projects.
Tags: Linux, Zend, PHP, Bash, SVN, Automation, Continuous Integration, Release Management,
Dallas CSharp SIG - MSBuild Fundamentals
On 8/5/2010, Leblanc presented "MSBuild Fundamentals" at the Dallas C# Sig. If you are interested in seeing the video, Shawn Weisfeld has captured and archived it on his blog and blip.tv. This post reiterates what was discussed in the video, and gives you a better format for quick reference scanning.
Configuration in Silverlight
ConfigurationManager, the commonly used .NET configuration API, is unavailable in Silverlight applications. The minimum code option is to deserialize an XML configuration file, or to read from initParams.
Tags: Silverlight, Configuration, Change Management, Release Management,
Web.Config Transformations in VS2010 vs FlexibleConfig.FlexibleConfigTask
If you do not know what Web.Config Transformations are, please take a look at Chris Koenig's "Hot Do I" video series on the subject.
One of the problems that I see with these types of transformations is that they are highly dependent on "Solution Configurations". Since we have 3 environments/DevEnvironments to support, i.e. integration, regression, and uat, 3 solution configurations had to be created with 3 transformation files. Even using small teams, a DevId had to be supported in a connectionString section, in-case the team is distributed (not collocated).
Whilst working in Silverlight or WPF, it is quite common to have a developer work on UI using mocked services; whilst another developer ties the data services layer with the concrete service versions. A DevTask also needs to be considered in the build, to support this configuration.
Should the Solution Configurations approach be taken to support DevId, DevEnvironment, DevTask, and/or DevBranch, it would quickly become unmanageable with Web.config Transformations, as too many extra files would be needed.
Tags: Change Management, MSBuild, Configuration, Release Management,
MSBuild FlexibleConfigTask
A few months ago, we concentrated on a technical debt feature, so that we could improve our team’s development work flow. Our work became an MSBuild task & FlexibleConfig.FlexibleConfigTask, and this solved a lot of issues that used to bother developers.
This feature became high priority as a result. If you are suffering from similar problems, then you are welcome to purchase this feature though our products page.
Tags: MSBuild, Change Management, Configuration, Release Management,