Preface

This book is your guide to mastering the comprehensive reports that are part of Team Foundation Server and Microsoft's main Application Life Cycle Management (ALM) suite. TFS Reporting provides the ability to track different metrics of development projects throughout the Application Life Cycle; these include team progress, bugs, the current backlog, test progress, and so on, using well-integrated and familiar tools such as Excel and SQL Server Reporting Services. Team Web Access reports are also explained in this book, providing a quick progress status view via different charts, work item queries, as well as inbuilt reports. The book starts by giving you a walkthrough of TFS and the reporting architecture. Then it jumps into the basics of Excel reporting, describing each of the standard reports available. Finally, you will learn how to use the powerful tools available in SQL Server Reporting Services to create and customize robust reports and how to design and customize a dashboard featuring reports relevant to you.