How to add custom state for WorkItems in Visual Studio Team Services

Question

I am using Visual Studio Team Services ( http://visualstudio.com/ ) with Visual Studio 2012.

I want to add a new State Value for WorkItems. After searching, I found that I could change the process template to achieve this. I tried the menu item "Team \ Team Project Collection Settings \ Process Template manager", but I get the following message:

Visual Studio could not get your user permissions from Team Foundation Server.

Contact your Team Foundation Server administrator to determine the cause of the error and the steps to resolve the problem.

If the problem persists, contact Microsoft Product Support Services.

Details: Access denied: [e-mail] needs the following $ resource permissions to complete this action: Administration

I added my user to every admin group I found in the tfs configuration for the project and collection, but I keep getting this message.

How to add custom state to WorkItems in Visual Studio Team Services?

Answer 1

It is now available in the Visual Studio Team Service. Follow these steps to find it.

• Account Home
• Process
• Click "Process of your project" (note that you cannot update processes by default. Inherit the process that you want to use for editing)
• Click "Work Item Types"
• Expand WIT
• Click Status
• Add New State

Also note that the VSTS user interface has recently been changed. Therefore, at the time of this writing

• You can get a Home account by clicking on the Team Service icon in the upper left corner. This page is also the home page of your account, and you can access it directly using the URL. For example: https://youraccountname.visualstudio.com/
• The process can be obtained from the submenu of the small gear icon in the menu bar [Browse | Settings | Safety | Gear Icon ]. Or click the gear icon to go to the admin section, and then click the Process tab or use the direct URL https://youraccountname.visualstudio.com/_admin

Hope this helps!

Thanks to Microsoft for its availability!

Answer 2

http://lajak.wordpress.com/2013/01/09/tfs-2012-versions-of-team-foundation-server/

Cons: • Unable to customize process template or workitem templates

Therefore, you cannot add new states to Team Foundation Services.

However, the "Team \ Team Project Collection Settings \ Process Template manager" simply allows you to update and download process templates where you can edit WIT XML. A more convenient way is to use / install TFS PowerTools and use the WIT editor "Tools → Process Editor → Types of work items → Open WIT from server / file".

Answer 3

This feature is not supported by Visual Studio Team Services. It seems to cause a lot of people (including me). See here for a (planned) feature request.

I suspect that the reason for your permission error is not because you did not assign the correct permission, but rather that the permission is not available for assignment.

Answer 4

To complete witadmin tasks, you need Foundation Foundation server administrative rights . What you probably mean is that you added yourself to admin / project admin by default.

I added my user to every admin group that I found in the tfs configuration for the project and collection,

You have two options for this:

• Ask your TFS administrator to perform this operation for you.
• Ask your TFS administrator to add you to the TFS administration group using the TFS admin console.