Microsoft has released the March 2008 version of the Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Foundation Server Power Tools. According to Microsoft, the Power Tools is "a set of enhancements, tools and command line utilities that improve the Team Foundation Server 2008 experience".
The Power Tools installer contains the following tools:
- Command line tool (TFPT.EXE)
- Team Explorer IDE menu additions
- Build Notification tool
- TFS Best Practices Analyzer
- Process Template Editor
- Work Item Templates
- Custom check-in policies
- TFS Server Manager
Brian Harry, a Microsoft Technical Fellow working as the Product Unit Manager for Team Foundation Server, offers more details about the content of the package released. This is a short list of the features included:
- Process Template Editor support for custom work item controls
- TFSServerManager client
- TFS BPA support for Windows Server 2008
- Work Item Template improvements
- Scriptable Team Project creation
- Support for 64-bit Sharepoint farms
- Improvements to tfpt review
- Performance improvements in tfpt online
The following operating systems are supported: Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2, Windows Vista, Windows Vista Service Pack 1, Windows XP Service Pack 2. The package installer needs Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Foundation Server, and Visual Studio 2008 Team Explorer. A WssExt64Bit installer is available providing the ability to install the Team Foundation Server WSS extensions into a 64-bit WSS instance.