Team Development with Visual Studio Team Foundation Server

Additional Resources
• For more information about creating a Team Build Type, see “Walkthrough: Creating
a Build Type in Team Foundation Build” at http://msdn2.microsoft.com/enus/library/ms181286(VS.80).aspx
• For more information about why Team Build checks out all the source code in a
workspace, see “Why does Team Build sync all sources in spite of my selecting only
a subset of solutions?” at
http://blogs.msdn.com/anutthara/archive/2005/12/07/500923.aspx
Consider Using Multiple Build Machines to Improve Performance
If you have multiple build types all executing on a single build server, the server could
become overwhelmed. In such a situation, you should consider executing different build
types on different build servers.
A build can take a long time to execute, especially if the build is for a large project. If
you are using CI or frequent scheduled builds, the build server might not be able to keep
up with the volume of builds being generated.
You can install multiple build servers to distribute the load among different servers.
Assign different build types to each server to even out the build load.
Additional Resources
• For more information, see “Chapter 7 – Team Build Explained” in this guide.
Projects
• Avoid dependencies across team projects.
• Use project references instead of file references.
• Use Web Deployment Project for Web applications.
• Use a single-solution strategy if you are working on a small team project.
• Use a partitioned-solution strategy if you are working on a large team project
with multiple independent sub-projects.
• Use a multiple-solution strategy if you are working on a very large team project
that requires many dozens of independent sub-projects.
Avoid Dependencies Across Team Projects
In general, you should avoid dependencies that cross team projects and instead try to
keep all related/dependent solutions/projects under same team project. This reduces the
need for build script customization. If you have a dependency, use project references to
define it, or branch the dependency from a shared project into your project. You should
avoid file references because they are more difficult to manage.
Additional Resources
• For more information about creating a workspace, see “How to: Create a Workspace”
at http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms181384(VS.80).aspx