Transitioning between Sprints/Iterations with TFS

February 6, 2012 / 2 Comments

AUTHOR: Mark

CATEGORY: Headlines, TFS

When transitioning from one Sprint (or iteration) to another it is necessary to modify all “current sprint” queries and any additional custom queries that are sprint/iteration specific. This is not a one time activity per team project but rather something you have to do after every sprint.

One way to eliminate this step is by creating a “release” called “Current” and moving the specific current sprint (Sprint 1, Sprint 2, or 2012-02-06 for example) under this release. The current sprint is simply moved from its defined release into the Current release when the sprint starts. When the sprint ends, the sprint is moved back to its original release and a different sprint moved under the Current release. Then, by changing all the sprint specific queries to select item under Current release, it is no longer necessary to change the queries every release – they just work.

Here are the steps in more detail:

1. To create a new release for Current, use the Areas and Iterations dialog and add a new Child Node.
    

   Once created, we position Current as first in the list. The dialog below shows Current and Sprint 1 as a member, indicating that Sprint 1 is the current sprint.
   

2. Next, all the queries defined under Current Sprint are modified to use the “under Current” clause. This modification only needs to be made one time when the project template is being configured. Below is a screen shot after modifying the Sprint Backlog query.
   
   
3. When moving from one sprint to the next, simply change the sprint hierarchy so that the new sprint (Sprint 2 for example) appears below the “Current” release and the previous sprint (Sprint 1) is returned to the correct release structure.

With these changes in place, the queries will just work as is when you transition from one sprint to the next.  Furthermore, this technique is valid and expected to work for TFS Preview, TFS11, Microsoft Visual Studio Scrum 1.0, and MSF for Agile.

(Note: Releases are not required, you can just have a parent node (Current) that appears anywhere in the hierarchy and move the Current Sprint below that – with corresponding queries to match.)

Comments

SadasK says:

January 16, 2013 at 8:28 AM

A very efficient way to get the information we need, while TFS team implements some kind of dynamic filter. I like it because if you have many queries there’s no need to ever change them. We have created three iterations of 1st level: “Done”, “Current” and “Planned”, and then move each sprint throughout these iterations. Very good job! Thank you!

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Puneet Bhagat says:

March 19, 2013 at 1:10 PM

Excellent workaround. This is so much better than updating queries every new iteration. Thank you!

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