Yes, I know it's November now :( We had originally planned to release them about two weeks ago but an early release to our MVP showed us that we still had work left to do to really get it ready. You can read about all the cool new stuff in this release here: http://blogs.msdn.com/bharry/archive/2008/10/01/preview-of-the-next-tfs-power-tools-release.aspx. We think the release is in pretty good shape but as I say in that post, this is a very big and very broad release. As such we are expecting to have to do some mop up work in the next update. At this point I'm expecting that to happen in late Jan or early Feb. In the mean time, please let us know about any issues you hit so we can investigate them and fix them for the next release.
In addition to the major new features I listed in the post above (Team Members, Windows Shell Extension, Power Shell support, and Custom component download, tfpt unshelve /undo and BPA improvements), we have added a couple of new things. The include:
tfpt searchcs - A new tfpt command that allows you to search for checkins, filtering by date, user, path, and string matches in the comment and checkin notes. It's a very handy tool if you are looking for a checkin but aren't 100% sure what you are looking for.
Improved setup - The new setup now installs for "all users" rather than just the current user. This was necessary because the Windows Shell Extension can only be installed for "all users". That's not really an improvement, just a change :) The improvement is that the setup will now automatically uninstall previous Power Tool versions (including Dec '07, Mar '08 and Jul '08). This will eliminate one step when updating your Power Tools builds. One complication comes with the change to "all users" install. If you've installed previous versions using your user account and you install the Oct '08 release with the same user account, everything will work. However, if you installed the previous version with a different account than the one you install the Oct '08 release with, it will not work. You will need to log in to that account and uninstall the previous version. We had serveral MVPs hit issues with this where they had previous installs on other user accounts and had forgotten about it.
Oh, and one more thing I want to point out - the Power Tools can be installed and run on 64-bit clients. This includes the Windows Shell Extension (which means the Power Tools include both 32 and 64-bit versions of that component).
You can download the Oct '08 TFS Power Tools here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=FBD14EEA-781F-45A1-8C46-9F6BA2F68BF0&displaylang=en
We're very eager to hear what you think. You can either post on my blog or provide comments on the MSDN forum.
Brian
I especially love the shell extension and powershell snapin. Great stuff.
Is there a reason why the shell extension does not offer a "View History" command?
And a minor issue: The shell extension dialogs do not have the Vista "theme" look, but are like the classic pre-XP Windows dialogs.
I was excite about the shell extension but they don't show up. I read in the help file that they are retreived async but I've waited a few minutes.
I am testing it over remote desktop and don't know if this would explain it.
I'll check later Monday when I'm at our office.
Should and extra action be taken to enable it?
Dang, I should have mentioned it. Because the impact of the shell extension can be system wide, we decided to not enable it by default. When you run setup, you have to explicitly choose the option to install it.
History is one of the next things to add. Expect to see it in the next release. I'll look into the Vista theming, thanks.
I've been eagerly waiting for this one. Wicked! Thanks.
I do not understand the sentence "improvement is that the setup will NOT automatically uninstall" - should be NOW? Or how can NOT uninstalling eliminate one step?
I am not a fan of blog posts that are just a repeat of an announcement on other blogs, but in this case
Thanks for the updated release! The new Shell extension is really valuable, not least to convince users of Tortoise etc that TFS is a worthy substitute.
My other favorite this time is the "Team Member" folder. Very handy to have quick access to things team members can do. An unexpected feature but I'm really happy with it.
Keep up the good work!
Thanks mjurek! What a difference a letter makes :) I've fixed the post.
The PowerShell extension is a great addition.
One little issue to look at for the next release though:
It is easy to check-out and lock a file in a single command:
tfpend -edit -Lock checkin MyFile.cs
Checking-out a file first, then locking it later does not seem possible:
tfpend -edit MyFile.cs # Works fine
tfpend -edit -Lock checkin MyFile.cs # No error, but does not do anything
Of course, one can revert to the tf.exe command:
tf lock /lock:checkin MyFile.cs
In the future, you could either add to the semantics of Add-TfsPendingChange to make changes cumulative, or create a Add-TfsLock command...
Vincent.
Oktober was nieuwe release beloofd van de TFS (team foundation) power tools. Ik had deze post al een
I'm afraid the Windows Shell Extension doesn't work for me.
I can see a Team Foundation Server option in the Windows Explorer context menu but the sub menu just lists "Reconnect to server".
When I select it I just get a dialog box with a message reporting that it is unable to connect to Team Foundation Server. Everything TFS related works as expected in Visual Studio. So not sure what is missing.
I was searching for a docu to develop my on CollaborationProvider for Lotus Sametime, but couldn't find anything. When will it be available?
Good feedback Vincent, thank you.
Gurb, I'll forward this on to the developer and see if they have ideas.
Achim, I expect to blog something about it this week.
Gurb, is it possible that you connect to TFS with something other than your Windows credentials? Right now the shell extension only supports Windows credentials. We'll be adding support for explicitly providing credentials in a future release.
The latest version of the TFS Power Tools is available for download here . You can read about all the