Friday 6 June 2008

Team Foundation Server (TFS) 2008 Licensing Change

I'm looking into the licensing for TFS 2008 for my employers as my team are looking to migrate from VSS to TFS (hooray) and I have been asked to take the lead in this work. With TFS 2005 anyone who was going to raise issues (bugs, requests, and the like) in TFS, even if using the TeamPlain web client, had to have a valid CAL. This was a bit of an expensive pain and meant that at my last company (at least when I left) Gemini continued to be used by the Support team to raise and manage bugs, until someone (a ScrumMaster I think) moved them into an appropriate TFS project as a part of the project backlog.

Well with TFS 2008 this situation has changed. CALs are no longer required to raise bugs, add stories, and that sort of thing! This is fantastic news in my opinion as it should help encourage companies to move more wholeheartedly (and more fully) to TFS, a product which I really rate!

I can't wait to get it installed and get the new Conchango Scrum for TFS 2008 addin installed.

Check this blog for more on TFS 2008 licensing.

3 comments:

Dan Meineck said...

Hey Neil,

Good spot! Do you know if there is a licensing model that allows users of TFS2005 to upgrade to 2008? At the moment we think we are going to have to pay outright for an upgrade.

Dan

Neil Robbins said...

Hi Dan,

cheers mate. Check this link out, the guy seems to be suggesting that it'll only do you any good if you have software assurance, or are downgrading.

Neil Robbins said...

Hi Dan,

just re-read you question, my liquid pub lunch probably didn't help ;)

The easy answer to the question is I don't know. Best to get someone to check with an MS advisor on these things I'd have thought. Either way though you won't need as many CALs, and could ditch Gemini.