Planet SCM

At PDC last night Ed Thomson announced our latest product, the Teamprise Remote Accelerator.  This is a single user Team Foundation Server proxy designed for use by lone remote developers working off-site.  The product was initially developed for internal use as we have quite a few developers that work off site most of the time, like myself.  However when talking with a number of our customers we realised that other people would also get great benefit so we decided to release it as a product.

How Does it Work?

The Teamprise Remote Accelerator looks to Visual Studio or Teamprise clients just like any other Team Foundation Proxy Server.  The notion of a download proxy is part of the Team Foundation Server version control protocol.

Basically, when you want to know the latest version of something the TFS client talks to Team Foundation Server and asks what the latest version of something is and requests a download token.  If a TFS proxy server is configured then the file with that download token is downloaded from the local proxy server.  If the file has already been cached by the proxy server then it can be downloaded immediately over the local network rather than having to wait for the file to be downloaded over the wide area network.

How is this different to the TFS Proxy Server from Microsoft?

Microsoft allow you to purchase TFS Proxy Servers for remote your remote offices.  This software lives on a Windows Server machine in the same domain as the Team Foundation Server and is running IIS.  It is a great solution when you have more than a couple of people at the remote site.  The Microsoft TFS proxy server will get the requested file the first time that someone requests it from the proxy server and when the second person requests the same version of that file they will get it instantly from the local network.  The problem is that the initial user does not see any real performance gain - therefore you need more than one person to make the product worthwhile - unless you seed the cache (see my blog post to explain how to do that with the Microsoft TFS Proxy Server).

The Teamprise Remote Accelerator runs as a process in the notification area of your local machine, so does not need a dedicated server.  It can also be configured to "seed" the cache - i.e. you tell the Remote Accelerator what areas of the version control repository that you are interested in and it will poll the server for changes periodically and download the latest versions of any changed files for you.  That way, the file is more likely to exists locally the first time you ask for it.

Additionally, the Teamprise Remote Accelerator connects to TFS using your TFS credentials - regardless of if your machine is on a domain or not.  Please note that the remote accelerator only connects to TFS with a single set of credentials and these credentials much match those that you are using to connect to TFS.  The Teamprise Remote Accelerator is therefore limited to a single user connection and is not suitable for workgroups.

That said - if you have multiple machines on your network, either physically or you are running Virtual Machines, then you can configure them to point to your local remote accelerator if you wish.

What sort of productivity improvements are we talking about here?

Like everything, it depends on your use.  If you would like to see detailed benchmarks, then take a look at the Remote Accelerator pages on the Teamprise website.  Inside Teamprise we are pretty heavy users of branching and we also run quite a few machines to test access to TFS from lots of different operating systems.  Therefore we are always creating new TFS workspaces and downloading source so we see huge productivity improvements (which was the main reason why we wrote this product in the first place). 

As part of our beta-testing we made early versions of the Remote Accelerator available to a few Team System MVP's and select customers, and they too have been seeing pretty impressive performance.  Fellow Team System MVP (and all-round community legend), Willy-Peter Schaub has been blogging about his experiences here.  Since this version we have made several major performance improvements to the code as part of our release process.

Basically, if you think the Remote Accelerator is of use, then I would encourage you to sign up for a free trial and take it for a spin for 30-days on us.

Sounds nifty - how much is it?

$99 USD per person.

Ok, how do I sign up?

First, I would encourage you to download the Remote Accelerator and then sign up for a free 30-day trial license.  If you have any feedback or comments on the product then let us know.  Once you have decided if the remote accelerator works for your scenario then you can purchase from our store.

What next?

This first release concentrated on performance and functionality.  While we are continually looking to improve the performance of the Remote Accelerator and improve the remote TFS experience, we are also looking to make the product both easier to use and easier to tell how well it is working for you.  If you have anything you would like to see in the next version of the Remote Accelerator then please let us know.

In case you hadn't heard, this week is Microsoft PDC 2008 in LA.  Sadly I'm not able to make it over this time due to some health issues, however the Teamprise team will be out in full force.  We have quite a few new things to show people this week including:

• Integration with TFS 2010
• Publishing JUnit test results into TFS (2005, 2008 and 2010)
• A brand new product!!

So if you happen to be at PDC then please stop by the Teamprise booth at the Partner Expo. Also, Brian the Build Bunny will be making an appearance at the ShowOff event tonight so if you are a fan of Brian's work, then stop by and give him some votes.

If, like me, you are stuck back at the office wishing you'd managed to get out to PDC then don't forget to keep an eye on my blog for Teamprise news through the week and on the Microsoft PDC site to follow the conference virtually.

We just released a new Radio TFS episode on check-in policies.  You can listen to the show here, but don't forget that you can subscribe to the show using the RSS Feed in iTunes or Zune (http://feeds.feedburner.com/radiotfs).  As we mention in the show, we have a set of special episodes coming up that you really won't want to miss so now is the time to subscribe.

The other week Brian Randall and I sat down with Carl and Richard to record a .Net Rocks episode.  Honestly, you wait years for a Brian Randall podcast and then three come along at once!

In this episode we talked about what's been happening in the Team System world since 2005, share some best practice war stories and look forward to some the new goodies coming up in the next release.  You can get the episode here.

Don't forget that if you like listening to podcasts about Team System and Team Foundation Server, then hopefully you'll love Radio TFS :-)

In this first episode back from the summer break we talk about the features available in TFS Version Control and talk about some of the fundamental concepts that you should understand to make your life easier.  Don't forget to stay tuned all the way to the end when I offer up a brainteaser for everyone and Paul goes crazy and offers a FULL copy of Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Team Suite to a lucky listener drawn at random who provides a correct answer to radiotfs@gmail.com before the end of August 2008.

If that is not enough for you, Mickey is running a competition over at Team System Rocks where you could win a years MSDN Premium Subscription with Visual Studio Team Suite.

Don't forget that you can subscribe to the show using the RSS Feed in iTunes or Zune. You can also listen to the show direct.

For feedback or suggestions for future shows please contact us at radiotfs@gmail.com or leave a comment over at the Radio TFS web site.

It turns out that the little video I posted yesterday has taken on a bit of a life of it's own.  Last time I checked, it was in the top 10 Science and Technology posts for YouTube in Ireland.  It's funny how it is always the posts that you do more for your own entertainment that take off. 

Anyway, there is no doubting that Brian is a bit of a character, he's already recorded his first TV appearance as a guest on this weeks, "This Week in Channel 9" (to be broadcast soon).  I wish that Nabaztag had an affiliate program as it sounds like I may have sold a few rabbits for them. 

Anyway, if you can't afford your own bunny, then you can have the next best thing for free.  Your very own Brian the Build Bunny Background on the desktop of a computer near you (standard and widescreen versions available).  Click here to chose a image size that suits you.

I'm always keen try new and novel ways to keep in touch with the status of my software projects.  Fortunately, Team Foundation Server provides many ways to do this.  While the Build Wallboard is fun if you have a spare monitor and machine lying around, I wanted to experiment with some inexpensive dedicated devices, and so Brian the Build Bunny was born.

Brian is a Nabaztag smart rabbit.  He reads out details of check-ins and builds.  If a build has failed then his ears go down to show how sad he feels, but if you fix the build his ears will soon pick up again.

I've had Brian for about a year now waiting to do this project, but when I tried it in the past I always found the response times from the rabbit to be too slow.  However earlier this year, the Nabaztag developers updated the code running the rabbits so that they are now using the XMPP (Jabber) protocol to receive updates and the service now seems pretty good.

Brian is now sitting on my desk chattering away and letting me know what is happening in TFS.  If you want to find out more about how he works and see him in action then take a look at the video. If your company blocks YouTube but you have Silverlight installed then you can view a higher quality version of the video courtesy of the Windows Live Streaming service.  I'll go through the code behind Brian in a later post if there is any interest, but it is pretty much a standard TFS event listener that then sends text to the rabbit using the Nabaztag API.

I've just posted the latest installment of Radio TFS.  I'm actually a show behind on editing so expect to see episode 6 up soon.  However, in episode 5 Paul, Mickey and I attempt to answer some of the common questions we hear people ask about Team System including:

• What is Team System?
• Which edition is right for me?
• Why can't I find Team Foundation Server on MSDN?
• What is Team Foundation Server Workgroup Edition?
• Is VSTS 2005 compatible with TFS 2008?
• Why can't I see Team Foundation Server when I install Team Suite?
• What are my options for migrating from my old system(s) to TFS?
• Can I use TFS with VB6, .NET 1.1, Eclipse etc?
• What is a Team Project - how should it be scoped?
• I deleted a file locally, I do a "Get Latest" and TFS doesn't download it - why?

As well as the usual sprinkling of tangents along the way.

Click here for a direct link to this episode.

If you have any questions that you would like answered, or if you have any comments and feedback about the show then please contact us at radiotfs@gmail.com or visit the website at http://radiotfs.com for quick links to subscribe to the feed in iTunes, Zune etc.