Agile.org has some create webcasts on subjects concerning Agile, Scrum. You can either sign up to them or go to the archive listing. Couple of interest are:
Agile Practices in a Traditional Organization
Adopting Test-First Development
Release Duration and Enterprise Agility
On May 15th is Agile and Quality: It is not an Oxymoron but a Necessity
Click here to check out the public webcast series.
Testa 
Microsoft is storyboarding the process of code coverage for manual testing. They are also looking for you to complete a quick survey on the subject. The Visual Studio ALM team are asking for our help so let’s give it to them. Click below to do the survey.
Code Coverage for Manual Testing Survey
This is how tools get made that we will use, thanks for helping.
Testa 
If you are interested in following
any of the MSDN Forum’s there is a gadget you can download that makes access to
your favourite threads quick and simple.
Download here.
Testa [:)]
It is Methodology May at the TALMUG
Methodology. In the world of software development there are not many words that raise contention quite as quickly as this. But why is that? What are the differences between Agile, Iterative, and Rigorous software development methodologies? There has been buzz about Scrum, XP, Lean, Waterfall, Kanban, and RUP for years; how do they fit into this discussion? But most importantly, why should you care? What does the test team think of all this?
In Methodology May the TALMUG brings you a panel of ALM professionals to discuss and debate these very questions and maybe help you see what methodology could work best at your company.
Pizza and Pop will be available at 5:30pm - Come out and join in on the discussions.
Being held at 40 University, Suite 1301, Toronto meeting starts at 6pm.
Follow on twitter @TOALMUG
Click here to Sign Up
Testa 
Dave Lloyd has updated GetHistory a power tool for displaying work item history. Now you can export the work item history to excel. If your company has a audit process that has to be followed this tool may help you report on changes to requirements, test cases, bugs in just a few steps.
Click Get History to get the newest version. Keep your eye out on this tool you never know what features Dave may add!
Testa 
MTM needs a feature that allows testers to describe what an individual test case iteration is testing.
Right now I add a parameter to the last steps expected results "@Notes" and for each iteration of a test case I add to the Notes what I am testing in each iteration. Example would be testing a address site. My test case will go through all the address fields so any testing I would need can be done with parameters and iterations even boundary. But I need a easy way to identify what is being tested by an iteration.
Vote for this feature “Identifier that describes what each test case iteration is testing”
Testa 
Check out instructions on how to create reports for your TFS2010 Test Results. There is also an example that you can follow.
Testa 
Karthik K.K has posted on LinkedIn (click to see) a chart that compares the features of Visual Studio & Test Manager to Quick Test Professional (QTP).
I like the last item:
| Visual Studio 2010 Test | QTP | Who’s Best |
| VSTS is cheaper and can be used for both development & testing. | QTP is costlier and can be used ONLY for testing. | VSTS |
VSTS can also be used by Business Analyst, Project Managers, and Stakeholders. It can assist teams being Agile or Scrum or Waterfall thru a process template. The process template can be customized to meet your company need. VSTS reports on all aspects of a project and can tell you at any time where in the project you are at, the quality of the project to date, the status of your requirements/user stories. You can have a “Requirement to Test Matrix” in seconds at anytime.
If this alone has got your attention and you want to know more contact me directly.
Testa 
The first Toronto VS ALM User Group kick off meeting is being held on April 12th @6:30pm sign up at TALMUG to get the details and register.
The User Group is for all roles within the Application Life Management team. Topics presented will vary from generic ALM practices to ALM with Visual Studio. If your involved in product management, a stakeholder, a business analysis or product owner, a developer or a tester this User Group is for you.
The goal of the first meeting will be to:
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Define the group’s mission
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Select an appropriate name
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Document the roles of the executive
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Recruit volunteers
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Funding
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Discuss how to reach out for sponsors
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Discuss meeting locations
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Discuss ideas for the first few meeting topics
Come out on April 12th and help us to kick-off this new user group code named TALMUG.
Testa 
Team Foundation Server (TFS) and Visual Studio(VS) excels when it comes to requirements traceability. Depending on what process you are using in TFS your stakeholders needs are documented in a work item called one of the following: requirements, user stories, use cases or backlog items. For this blog I am using the term requirement.
What is requirements traceability?
Continuous knowledge of the life of a requirement from conception to creation to design to development to verification to implementation and change. The ability to trace a requirements state and/or status at any time during a project.
First step in making requirements traceable.
In Visual Studio other work items are used to identify work that needs to be done to a requirement before it can be deemed done. There are different work item types depending on the process template you are using, however all contain the following: Task, Test Case, Shared Step, Bug. Additional work items can be added if not in your process template like Review, Issue, Change Request to name just a few. All these work items can be linked to the requirement they are helping to fulfill. Visual Studio 2010 introduced the concept of hierarchy by which a work item is linked to another work item using a linked type. The work item task is a child of a requirement, two requirements can be related, a test case tests a requirement. Work items like tasks may be linked to show predecessor or successor of another task. To learn more about choosing link types to effectively track your project click here MSDN Library.
Linked type listing:
Example of a requirement with linked work items:
What can be traced?
In Visual Studio during diagram modeling requirements and other work item types can be attached to objects in the model. During modeling you can either create or link requirements. This allows you to trace work items like requirements from a model diagram.
Example of a Use Case model with requirements linked:
Within the requirement work item I can see all other linked work items and information about them like state, assigned to. Knowing the state of work items linked to a requirement tells me the state and status of the actual requirement itself.
Development when checking in code to VS source control can be forced to associate what requirement or other work item their code relates too. Code check-ins create a Change Set that contains information about the check in and gets linked to the work item(s) associated during a check-in. When fixing bugs this is a nice feature.
In Visual Studio I can create queries to show any type of traceability report. Examples: Requirements to Tests Matrix, Requirements to Tasks, Requirements to Issues, Test Cases with Bugs to name just a few. Queries can also be exported or opened in excel, sent to someone thru email or opened in Microsoft Project. Queries exported to excel allows for adding additional excel reporting features like a Pivot Charts.
Requirements to Test Matrix – is there test cases for each requirement
Visual Studio comes with many reports that trace Requirements showing linked tasks and remaining work left, test case results state and many more scenario’s. Remember depending on what process template you are working with will determine the reports you see.
Example:
Checkout MSDN library for lots more information on Requirements Traceability in TFS & VS.
Testa 