Teams Toolkit Overview
Note
Currently, this feature is available in public developer preview only.
Teams Toolkit for Microsoft Visual Studio Code helps you to create and deploy Teams apps with integrated identity, access to cloud storage, data from Microsoft Graph, and other services in Azure and Microsoft 365 with zero-configuration approach. For Teams app development, similar to Teams Toolkit for Visual Studio, you can use CLI tool, which consists of Toolkit teamsfx.
Teams Toolkit lets you create, debug, and deploy your Teams app right from Visual Studio Code. App development with the toolkit has the advantages of:
- Integrated identity
- Access to cloud storage
- Data from Microsoft Graph
- Azure and Microsoft 365 services with zero-configuration approach
Teams Toolkit brings all tools needed for building a Teams app in one place.
For Teams app development, similar to Teams Toolkit for Visual Studio Code, you can use CLI tool, which consists of Toolkit teamsfx.
User journey of Teams Toolkit
Teams Toolkit automates manual work and provides great integration of Teams and Azure resources. The following image shows Teams Toolkit user journey:
The main milestones of this journey are:
- Start by creating a new project or trying a sample Teams app.
- Add capabilities or edit manifest file as needed.
- Use Microsoft 365 account to build and debug your Teams app.
- Use Azure account to provision and deploy your app to cloud.
- Publish your app to Teams.
Install Teams Toolkit for Visual Studio Code
Open Visual Studio Code.
Select the Extensions view (Ctrl+Shift+X / ⌘⇧-X or View > Extensions):
Enter Teams Toolkit in the search box:
Select Install:
Tip
You can install Teams Toolkit from Visual Studio Code Marketplace.
Take a tour of Teams Toolkit
After Toolkit installation, you'll see the Teams Toolkit UI as shown in following image:
You can select Quick Start to explore the Teams Toolkit, or select Create a new Teams App to create one Teams project. If you have a Teams project created by Teams Toolkit v2.+ opened in Visual Studio Code, you will see Teams Toolkit UI with all functionalities as shown in the following image: You can select Quick Start to explore the Teams Toolkit, or select Create a new Teams App to create one Teams project. You can view a list of all Toolkit features when you create or open an existing project in Visual Studio Code sidebar.
Let's take a tour of the topics covered in this document:
Accounts
To develop a Teams app, you need at least one Microsoft 365 account with a valid subscription. If you want to host your backend resources on Azure, an Azure account is also needed. Teams Toolkit supports integrated experience to sign in, provision and deployment for Azure resources. You can create a free Azure account before you start.
Environment
Teams Toolkit helps you to create and manage multiple environments, provision, and deploy artifacts to the target environment for Teams App.
TeamsFx Collaboration
It allows developers and project owner to invite other collaborators to the TeamsFx project to debug, provision, and deploy the same TeamsFx project.
Development
Teams Toolkit helps you to create and customize your Teams app project that makes the Teams app development work simpler.
Create a new Teams app
It helps you to start with Teams app development by creating new Teams project using Teams Toolkit either by using Create new project or Create from samples.
Add capabilities
It helps to add other required Teams capabilities to Teams app during development process.
Add cloud resources
It helps you to optionally add cloud resources that fits your development needs.
Edit manifest file
It helps you to edit the Teams app integration with Teams client.
Deployment
During or after the development, ensure to provision, deploy, and publish Teams app before it is accessible to users.
Provision in the cloud
It integrates with Azure resource manager that enables you to provision Azure resources, which your application needs for code approach.
Deploy to the cloud
It helps you to deploy the source code to Azure.
Publish to Teams
After creating the app, you can distribute your app to different scope, such as individual, team, organization, or anyone. Publish to Teams helps you to publish your developed app.
CI/CD guide
It helps to automate your development workflow while building Teams application. CI/CD guide provides tools and templates for you to get started while setting up CI or CD pipelines.
TeamsFx CLI
It is a text-based command line interface that accelerates Teams application development and also enables CI/CD scenario where you can integrate CLI in scripts for automation.
TeamsFx SDK
It helps you to reduce tasks of implementing identity and access to cloud resources to single-line statements with zero configuration.
Help and Feedback
In this section, you can find the documentation and resources you need. You can select Report issues on GitHub in the Teams Toolkit to get Quick support from product expert. Browse the issue before you create a new one, or visit StackOverflow tag teams-toolkit to submit feedback.
Let's explore Teams Toolkit features.
| Teams Toolkit Features | Includes... | What you can do |
|---|---|---|
| Accounts | ||
| Microsoft 365 account | Use your Microsoft 365 account with a valid E5 subscription for building your app. | |
| Azure account | Use your Azure account for deploying app on Azure. | |
| Environment | ||
| local | Deploy your app in the default local environment with local machine environment configurations. | |
| dev | Deploy your app in the default dev environment with remote or cloud environment configurations. You can create more environments, as you need. | |
| Development | ||
| Create a new Teams app | Use the toolkit wizard to prepare project scaffolding for app development. | |
| View samples | Select any of Teams Toolkit's 12 sample apps. The toolkit downloads the app code from GitHub, and you can build the sample app. | |
| Add capabilities | Add other required Teams capabilities to Teams app during development process. | |
| Add cloud resources | Add optional cloud resources suitable for your app. | |
| Edit manifest file | Edit the Teams app integration with Teams client. | |
| Deployment | ||
| Provision in the cloud | Allocate Azure resources for your application. Teams Toolkit is integrated with Azure Resource Manager. | |
| Zip Teams metadata package | Create the app package that can be uploaded to Teams or Developer Portal. It contains the app manifest and app icons. | |
| Deploy to the cloud | Deploy the source code to Azure. | |
| Publish to Teams | Publish your developed app and distribute it to scopes, such as personal, team, channel, or organization. | |
| Developer Portal for Teams | Use Developer Portal to configure and manage your Teams app. | |
| CI/CD guide | Automate your development workflow while building Teams application. | |
| Help and Feedback | ||
| Quick Start | View the Teams Toolkit Quick Start help within Visual Studio Code. | |
| Documentation | Select to access the Microsoft Teams Developer Documentation. | |
| Report issues on GitHub | Select to access GitHub page and raise any issues. | |
Tip
Browse existing issues before you create a new one, or visit StackOverflow tag teams-toolkit to submit feedback.
See also
Feedback
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