What to install to connect TFS and EA

[Steven Bos]

Hello,

We have a nice amount of user stories stored in TFS. Now I want make a connection with TFS and trace the PBI from TFS with any artifact within EA. Now it seems I need to install Visual Studio and TFS and ... a lot.

Question: Due to cost and licensing I want to know what bare minimum do I have to install to make a connection between EA and TFS?

I use the EA12 Ultimate edition and have nothing regarding Visiual Studio installed (I am no programmer but the designer/requirements man).

[Geert Bellekens]

Steven,

If you want the "real" integration you'll have to install the VS packet locally as well. IIRC there's a free edition of VS that only contains the TFS part and not the developer part of Visual Studio.

But you might be able to make due with something simpler.
The simplest option would be to export the user stories from TFS in a CSV format (via excel or directly) and import them into EA with  the CSV import.

A more elaborate solution could be to write a program/script/macro to ge the info from TFS the TFS server and synchronize them with the elements in EA. (one way interface)

You can even write a two-way interface, but that would probably defeat the purpose.

Geert

[Steven Bos]

IIRC there's a free edition of VS that only contains the TFS part and not the developer part of Visual Studio.

Found one but that does not have the Project Explorer you need to setup TFS.
You got a link to this free VS package so I got the correct one?

[Geert Bellekens]

I'm no specialist, but I believe this answer on SO should help you further.

Geert

[Steven Bos]

I have installed the Visual Studio Community version. This makes it possible to link with a Visual Studio project from EA.

At least now I can do:
- version control
- reverse engineering on code
- security with TFS

Still missing is getting the Work Items from VS linked to EA. Seems that you have to be a Project Administrator to config this in VS. Today a collegaue is going to give it a try for me to setup these Work Item Area's.

[Steven Bos]

OK - working with CSV import/export (for now)

Things to look at:
- make sure the same status from TFS are known within EA.
- replace the Work Item for Requirement - EA does not know what a work item is.

After that import of requirements is easy. Now I just have to see how synchronize without a load of doubles creation.

[Geert Bellekens]

Steven,

If you include the GUID of the element in the import/export definition you should be able to update existing items rather creating new ones.

Geert

[Steven Bos]

OK - the update with the GUID has annoying feature which I might have to post as a bug.

Situation is that I have 'root' package for the requirements.
- req1
- req2
- package1 with req3
- package2 with req4

If I am now 'refreshing' the requirement including the GUID for these four requirements the root package looks like this:
- req1
- req2
- req3
- req4
- package1 <-- empty
- pacakge2 <-- empty

Bit of annoying that all the requirements are moved from their packages to the root package.

[Geert Bellekens]

Have you tried the "Preserve Hiearchy" option?

On the other hand, I sort-of understand why this is happening.
You are importing the requirements in the selected root package, so EA puts them there.

If you can't get it to do exactly as you want there's a simple alternative if you know a little bit of VBA.
You could modify my Simple VBA Excel to EA importer to take into account the GUID and leave the requirement where it is.

Geert