Team Foundation Server licensing model
I have used Team Foundation Server Beta 3 refresh and RC for a while. The product has many of the same functionalities as CruiseControl.NET and nUnit, except that you get a complete package of tools and templates integrated with Visual Studio. Ok, that's fine, I actually like tightly integrated tools (when they work as expected), but how about licensing?
Ok, for you guys that have installed TFS and uses Continuous Integration or doing manual/nightly builds with the integrated build system, you have probably configured testing and code analysis for the build. But then you get some server errors, right?
Typical errors are:
In order to perform Code Analysis on managed binaries, MSBuild needs to launch FxCop. MSBuild is unable to locate the FxCop binaries. Make sure Visual Studio Team Edition for Software Developers or Visual Studio Team Suite is installed and run MSBuild from within the "Visual Studio Command Prompt" or specify the path to FxCop by setting the FXCOPDIR environment variable."
The installation documentation does not state that you have to install FxCop or Visual Studio 2005 for Developers on the machine. Well, anyway, you decide to fix the issue and installs Visual Studio 2005 for Developers. The errors goes away! 
Then you start exploring with WebTesting and Load Testing, which are cool features in Visual Studio 2005 for Testers. But, again, you get some new errors:
C:\Program Files\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v8.0\TeamBuild\Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.targets : warning : TestTypes\{37e36796-fb51-4610-8d5c-e00ceaa68b9f} could not be loaded because the TIP could not be instantiated for the following reason(s): Could not load file or assembly 'Microsoft.VisualStudio.QualityTools.LoadTestPackage, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a' or one of its dependencies. The system cannot find the file specified.
….
Hmmm…this seems odd, I can't do load testing on the build server. Again trying to solve this issue, I installs Visual Studio 2005 for Testers on the Build Server. But, how about licensing? Do I need a new license to run my tests ? Well, not really. The Microsoft® Visual Studio® 2005 Team System Licensing states the following:
"As part of the build process, Team Foundation Server may run quality tests and/or analysis on the precompiled or compiled code. These tests rely on functionality found within Team System client products, typically within the Team Edition for Software Developers or Team Edition for Software Testers products. These products may be installed on the build machine by licensed users of those products, as long as they are not directly used by any individuals who are not licensed for those products. Team Foundation Server will gather results of the build as well as any quality tests or analysis and deposit them in the Team Foundation Server data repository."
In my team, only 1 person has the complete Team Suite, as it's quite expensive. We get Visual Studio 2005 for Developers through our partner program with Microsoft (Gold partner). In real life this means, it's OK to install VS 2005 Team Suite (or for Testers) on the Build server as long as one Team member has the license. But, the other team members cannot log on to the server and use the Team Suite to configure the build process. The license is personal, meaning that the person who has the license, can install it anywhere and do whatever he/she want's with it.
Still wondering wheter TFS is worth the license, as you can achieve the same results with OpenSource software, but with not so integrated tools. I would say, that if you have a license with Team Suite, go ahead and configure the TFS environment, if not go OpenSource.
A couple of links:
http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/showpost.aspx?postid=276741&siteid=1
http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=98242&SiteID=1
No comments yet.
Leave a comment
Search
Knut Hamang
