TFS Migration Blog : Synchronization

TFS Migration Tool for Rational ClearCase Released

mmitrik — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 23:29:00 GMT

At last, the migration tool for Rational® ClearCase® is available for free download. This tool provides the ability to migrate ClearCase data to TFS, and it also provides a service that will keep items in sync between TFS and ClearCase. Together, these features will make the process of migrating from ClearCase to TFS much simpler, and far more automated.

The tool and documentation (installed with the tool) can be downloaded from the new Team Foundation Server Migration and Integration Solutions page.

A quick summary of the features of the tool:

Supports migration of base ClearCase VOBs
Migrate a snapshot of source control to TFS
Migrate files to Team Foundation Server while preserving history
Migrate branches to Team Foundation Server retaining the branching structure/hierarchy
Bidirectional synchronization of data between TFS and ClearCase

For help with this tool please use the Team Foundation Server - Version Control forum on MSDN. Be sure to indicate the question is specific to the migration tool in the title of the post so we can identify questions more quickly.

V1.0 of the Migration and Synchronization Toolkit has been released!

mmitrik — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 19:00:00 GMT

The first complete version of the Migration and Synchronization Toolkit has been released on CodePlex! To get the latest source code, including the complete reference implementations, please visit the CodePlex page for the Toolkit: http://www.codeplex.com/MigrationSyncToolkit

In addition to updating the source code and reference implementations, a significant amount of new documentation has been added. From the home page of the CodePlex project, there are links to pages to help users getting started, define the features, and provide guidance of building a tool, just to name a few. Over the next few weeks, we will be adding to the content on the wikis, including some user feedback from our pilot programs for the toolkit.

Please also remember to give us feedback! Any comments on the usage of the toolkit, questions about writing tools, questions on using the tools, and comments on the documentation are all welcomed. All the feedback that we can get will ultimately help to improve the Toolkit, so please speak up if you have any comments.

Since the prerelease version, we've seen many requests for various tools to help migrate and synchronize data between version control and work item/bug tracking systems. Part of the motivation behind this toolkit was to encourage community development of tools for common systems used by TFS users and potential TFS users. If you are interested in starting an open/shared source project to develop a tool, please let us know, and we can help to get a project started on CodePlex.

Migration and Synchronization Toolkit Prerelease Published on CodePlex

mmitrik — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 01:29:00 GMT

A prerelease of the Migration and Synchronization Toolkit has been released on CodePlex! If you are interested in seeing the progress that we have made to date, and are eager to try out the sample tools, please visit the project site on CodePlex at http://www.codeplex.com/MigrationSyncToolkit

All of the source code and documentation for the toolkit is available on the project site. The source code can be downloaded from the .zip archive on the Releases tab. From the home page, the Getting Started page should provide all of the info to setup and build the toolkit, and the Release notes contains the info pertinent to this prerelease.

Please note that this is a prerelease version of the Migration and Synchronization Toolkit. Several features are not complete and as testing has not completed, the code has the potential to contain bugs and overwrite data stored in TFS. Please be careful to use this only in a testing environment and not on live production data.

Synchronization of labels

mmitrik — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 17:28:00 GMT

In my previous posts, it was not made clear that the migration toolkit will support bi-directional synchronization as well as one-way conversion. This enables many useful scenarios including the ability to migrate portions of a project over time.

Synchronization does bring up some complex scenarios, especially for non-versioned items. We have come across a few questions concerning how labels in a version control system should be migrated/synchronized with TFS. Any feedback on this is welcome.

What level of support for migrating labels is optimal?

Should all labels be migrated during the initial conversion of data,
or should users be able to choose specific labels to migrate,
or should no labels be migrated (they can be added in TFS after migrating)?

For labels that exist in both systems (the original system and TFS) after initial conversion:

Is it useful to synchronize labels across systems?
Are there specific labels that would be useful to synchronize between systems (i.e. a recent build label)?
Should labels only be synchronized if they are manually chosen to be synchronized?