Migrating your Tools to Team Foundation Server


If you are a development shop, then you probably have certain tools you prefer to help with your development, such as a source-control system. Microsoft is taking steps to try to make it easy to convert from some of the major tools to using Team System and Team Foundation Server.

Version Control

Microsoft has provided a tool that allows you to migrate from Visual Source Safe (VSS) 6.0 to Team Foundation Source control. The migration can be broken into two phases. In the first phase, you analyze the VSS database; in second phase, you do the actual migration from the VSS database to Team Foundation Source Control. One of the best sources of information on this tool comes from Akash Maheshwari's blog (http://blogs.msdn.com/akashmaheshwari).

The first phase in the analysis is to determine whether you need to migrate, or whether you can simply pull the "leaves" of the branch directly into Team Foundation Server. This may depend on whether you care about the history. This phase is going to generate some reports for you, indicating the potential data loss that may occur during the migration. Using these reports, you should be able to configure some of the migration options to minimize this loss. Be aware, however, that some data loss is unavoidable. This is due to some aspects of the VSS data not being mapped into Team Foundation.

Once you are satisfied with the results from the first phase, you can proceed with the actual migration. Once the migration is complete, you will receive a report detailing any errors or warnings encountered during the migration.

While a detailed walkthrough of the conversion process is outside the scope of this book, we will present a high-level overview and refer you to more information.

The following is the general process for migrating from VSS to Team Foundation.

First, you need to install VSS on the machine on which you will be doing the conversion. Remember, the VSS database that you will be migrating must be version 6.0. If it is an older version, use the DDUPD utility (http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/guides/html/vstskupgradingvisualsourcesafe.asp) to upgrade the database. Make sure you install VSS 2005 on the conversion machine as well. To decrease the migration time, it is recommended that you copy the VSS database to a local directory on the conversion machine. Also, running the Analyze.exe (http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/guides/html/vsgrfss_analyze.asp) application can help to find and fix any integrity and corruption issues before you begin the analysis and migration of the database.

The VSS Converter application uses SQL Express in the migration process. SQL Express needs to be installed on the conversion machine, before the analysis and migration are started. Make sure you have administrator rights on SQL Express before you continue. Also, make sure you install Team Explorer on the conversion machine. The VSS converter application is part of the client portion of Team Explorer. Before you start the migration, make sure you are a member of the Team Foundation Administrator group in Team Foundation.

At this point, you are ready to run your analysis. Remember, the migration process is going to be time consuming, depending on the amount of data involved. It could be a day or longer, for a nontrivial sized repository. The process may also generate a fair amount of warnings, many of which can be discarded as being benign. One recommendation is to migrate sources one team at a time, which will typically be one folder. Once you know which folders to migrate, you will create the settings file. This is an XML file containing all the options for the migration. Once this file is ready, you run the VSS Converter application to begin your analysis. For more detailed information on the analysis phase, refer to the MSDN Library: Preparing To Migrate from Visual SourceSafe to Team Foundation (http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms181246).

After the analysis is finished, a report file is generated. This file indicates the data loss that may occur during the migration. As mentioned previously, some of this data loss can be prevented, but there will be some loss. At this point, you should make sure the potential data loss will not have a significant impact on your organization before you continue. The analysis phase will also generate a user map file. This file shows all the users who have performed any sort of operation on the folders that were analyzed. This file is used to map VS users to Team Foundation users. This is an optional step.

Finally, we are ready to perform the actual migration. Before you begin, make sure you have identified the destination folders in Team Foundation for each folder in VSS. If the destination folder already exists, it must be empty. If the destination folder does not exist, the VSS Converter application will create it automatically. Next, you need to make modifications to the settings file to prepare it for migration. At this point, you are ready to run the VSS Converter application and migrate the database. For more detailed information on the migration phase refer to the MSDN Library: Migrating from Visual SourceSafe to Team Foundation (http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms181247).

Once the VSS Converter application is finished, you need to review the report file, to see what errors and warnings occurred during the migration.

Once the migration is complete, you will need to change the source-control bindings of the solution files from VSS to Team Foundation. (See http://blogs.msdn.com/nagendra/archive/2005/09/30/475633.aspx for more information.)

Microsoft has also mentioned a conversion tool for use with Rational ClearCase. However, at this point, there is no information on the tool, when it will be available, or how it will work.

Work Item Tracking

Microsoft is also working on a tool that will allow you to migrate existing Rational ClearQuest work items into the Team Foundation work item tracking system. This conversion utility, CQConverter.exe, is included with Team Foundation Server. For detailed information on using this conversion utility, refer to the MSDN Library: Walkthrough: Migrating ClearQuest Work Items to Team Foundation (http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms181248(en-US,VS.80).aspx).



Professional Team Foundation Server
Professional Team Foundation Server
ISBN: 0471919306
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2004
Pages: 168

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