Operational differences in managing projects using TFS and Project
You can schedule projects by using the features that are available in Microsoft Project or Microsoft Project Professional, while maintaining the data and tracking work in Visual Studio Team Foundation Server (TFS). If you have Project Server deployed, you can best manage your enterprise project plans by installing Team Foundation Server Extensions for Project Server.
In this topic, you can learn about the benefits and operational differences of using the Team Foundation plug-in to Microsoft Project compared to integrating the two server products. For more information about Project Server, see Microsoft Project.
In this topic
Benefits of integrating TFS with Project Server
Operational differences between using Project and integrating TFS with Project Server
Publishing from Project Professional versus Project
Benefits of integrating TFS with Project Server
Integration between TFS and Project Server can become a considerable advantage for organizations that want to bridge the collaboration gap between their project management offices and their software development teams. By integrating the two server products, teams can work together more effectively in the following ways:
Acquire up-to-date insight into portfolio execution, alignment with strategic objectives, and resource usage of software development projects by leveraging the quantitative data in different systems.
Automate the sharing of project information across teams, and improve coordination between teams that use disparate methodologies, such as waterfall and agile, through common data and agreed-upon metrics.
Enable development and project-management teams to collaborate and communicate project timelines and progress by using familiar tools such as Visual Studio, Microsoft Project, and SharePoint Products.
If Project Server is not deployed, you can use the Team Foundation plug-in to Microsoft Project to manage projects based on work items in Team Foundation. When you install Visual Studio or Team Explorer, the Team Foundation plug-in to Microsoft Project is installed. By using the plug-in, you can add and change TFS work item data. You can plan projects, schedule tasks, assign resources, and track changes. Different users can update work items from different project plans.
The following table compares the main tasks that you can perform by using the Team Foundation plug-in to Microsoft Project with those that require integration of the two server products. You can use the plug-in with all editions of Project 2007, Project 2010, and Project 2013. To integrate TFS and Project Server, you must install Project Professional 2007, Project Professional 2010, or Project Professional 2013.
Feature |
Team Foundation plug-in to Microsoft Project |
TFS and Project Server Integration |
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Directly connect to TFS, and change work items and their dependencies. |
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Initiate project planning, schedule work, and manage project calendars. |
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Manage and synchronize dependency links. |
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View project status, schedule, and resource allocation. |
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Work with subprojects, standard projects, and enterprise projects. |
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Control the level of collaboration and synchronization. |
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View and leverage enterprise resource pools. |
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View resource allocation across multiple enterprise project plans. |
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Leverage portfolio optimization, demand management, and reporting (features available only with Project Server) |
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Operational differences between using the Team Foundation plug-in to Project and integrating TFS with Project Server
The following table summarizes the operational differences between using Project to publish and refresh TFS work items and synchronizing data between TFS and Project Server. t
Operational area |
Team Foundation plug-in to Microsoft Project |
TFS and Project Server Integration |
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Synchronization model |
Supports a synchronization process in which project managers can directly publish to or refresh from Team Foundation on demand.
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Supports a synchronization process in which project managers can control plan updates.
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Publish and refresh process |
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Rollup of work and resources |
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Setup and configuration |
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Publishing from Project Professional versus Project
When you publish tasks from Project Professional, you open the File menu, and then you choose Publish to publish the project plan to Project Server. After Project Server is updated, the synchronization engine pulls data from Project Server and determines what data to update in Team Foundation based on the data that is configured for synchronization. Only those team projects, work items, and fields that are configured for synchronization are updated.
When you publish tasks from Project, you choose Publish on the Team ribbon or the Team menu.