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Tracking Bugs, Tasks, and Other Work Items (Team Explorer Everywhere)

  • Article

You can use work items to track and manage your work and information about your team project. A work item is a database record that Team Foundation uses to track the assignment and progress of work. You can use different types of work items to track different types of work, such as customer requirements, product bugs, and development tasks.

The work item type determines the workflow states and transitions. The work item types that are available in a project depend on the project template that the project uses. Also, you can customize the work item types that are available in your team project to track your work in whatever way makes sense for your development environment.

Each work item represents an object that is stored in the Team Foundation database. Each work item is assigned a unique identifier, a work item ID, and a type, which is called the work item type. Work item IDs are unique across all work item types in all team projects in a team project collection. The work item type determines the fields that are available for tracking information, that defaults that are defined for each field, the rules and constraints that are positioned on these fields, and other objects that specify the work item workflow. Every change made to a work item field is stored in the work item log, which maintains a historical record of changes.

Work item tracking task overview

Main Tasks

Each work item is assigned

  1. Add or modify work items

  2. Attach files to work items

  3. Create links between work items

  4. Find or list a filtered set of work items

  • A unique ID

  • Work item type

  • State

  • Assigned to

All work items are associated with the following common elements:

  • Fields that contain information about the work item.

  • Rules for each field, such as the set of possible values.

  • A work item form, which controls how the work item fields appear.

  • A simple state-transition model that work item type authors can use to define required fields and values at different points during the work item’s lifecycle.

All work items also have the following common characteristics:

  • A set of common system fields.

  • A comprehensive record of changes to the work item.

  • Support for links to other work items, file attachments, or any other work product in esprfound.

You can create and modify work items by using the Team Foundation Server plug-in for Eclipse or Team Web Access. When creating or modifying individual work items, you can work in the work item form by using the Team Foundation Server plug-in for Eclipse or Team Web Access. You can make bulk updates to many work items at a time by using Team Web Access.

Common Tasks

Tasks

Supporting Content

Learn what tasks you can perform by using the Team Foundation Server plug-in for Eclipse. Several client applications interact with Visual Studio Team Foundation Server, and all of them require that you connect to a server that runs Team Foundation Server. If you connect to Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 2010, you must specify a team project collection. If you connect to any version of Team Foundation Server, you must specify a team project. All clients require that you have the necessary permissions to access the team projects that you select.

Getting Started with Team Explorer Everywhere and Team Foundation Server

Add and modify work items. You can track progress made to a team project by reassigning work items, adding information to them, and changing their state.

Adding and Modifying Bugs, Tasks and Other Work Items

Create and view hierarchies and dependencies among work items. You can create relationships between work items and other resources to plan projects, track dependencies, view hierarchical relationships, and find relevant information quickly.

Create Relationships Between Work Items and Other Resources (Team Explorer Everywhere)

Track the status of work items, and generate reports. You can generate a list of work items by using work item queries. You can build simple or complex queries to pinpoint the information that you need. Also, you can display the results of a query as a flat list or a tree list, which illustrates the linked associations among work items.

Finding Bugs, Tasks, and Other Work Items (Team Explorer Everywhere)

Share information with team members. You can organize team queries into folders and subfolders.

Sharing Work Items and Queries with Team Members (Team Explorer Everywhere)

Tasks

Supporting Content

Learn about the work items and artifacts that your process template provides. Understand how to use work items to support project management.

Create your project structure and iterations. You can define feature areas and iteration paths that support how you organize your project elements. You can assign work items to an area or iteration path.

Create and customize work item objects. You can customize the work items that are included with the product, add types of work items, and also customize types of links.

See Also

Other Resources

Team Foundation Server Plug-in for Eclipse