More free tools from Telerik, TFS Work Item Manager and Dashboard

If you're not following me on Twitter, and you're not following the Telerik.com Blogs, and you've otherwise missed the news on the echochamber we call the Internet, Telerik made another big announcement this week:

Expanding on our growing line of tools for .NET developers, this week Telerik released two new productivity applications for Microsoft's Team Foundation Server: TFS Work Item Manager and TFS Project Dashboard.

Oh, yeah...they're also both free!

These two tools are obviously aimed at .NET shops that are using TFS for managing their software development, so if you're not a TFS shop, no need to read further. If you are a TFS shop, these tools do two things for you:

1. Work Item Manager - The WIM (as it's known) simplifies the process of working with TFS work items, eliminating the often "clunky" workflow that exists by default. With a single program, you can now easily create work items, query work items, easily sort/filter/analyze items, work with tasks on an innovative "task board" (similar to Scrum Dashboard, but for the desktop), and better visualize all TFS work item data. The tool is designed to be flexible and work with any TFS process template.
2. Project Dashboard - This tool is all about visualizing TFS data. In fact, it's best used by having some dedicated monitor or TV screen in your development area that just runs the Dashboard where everyone can see it (it can auto disable screen savers and monitor power save settings). It displays things like latest TFS project activity, current iteration progress, project veolicity, and (my personal favorite) who broke the last build (with mug shot)! This is a great tool for managers, too, to easily keep tabs on TFS project status and health.

Telerik has been a TFS shop for quite some time now, and we've been using both of these tools internally for the better part of the last 6 months. They have helped all teams in Telerik be more productive with their TFS management tasks and have helped really unlock the data in TFS, turning it in to helpful information.

It works so well for us, we wanted to share it with you. You can download both of these tools from Telerik.com immediately and start trying them with your TFS projects. What do you have to lose?

Enjoy the tools and stay tuned for more exciting announcements!