How to: Publish or Refresh Work Items in Microsoft Excel or Microsoft Project

When you create a Microsoft Excel or Microsoft Project file, the work item information currently in the database is copied into the spreadsheet or project file. When you open the file again, you can update the file with current information from the work item database. Updating the file guarantees that your spreadsheet or project file reflects the changes that have occurred since you created the file.

Note

If your work item list is connected to a query, you can rerun the query to update the work item list to reflect the current query results.

Refreshing work items replaces the work item data in your document with the version from the work item database. This process erases any changes you have made. If you want to preserve your changes, publish them before you refresh the document.

Publishing work items sends the changes you have made to the work item database.

Microsoft Project enables you to control which work items are published and refreshed. For more information, see How to: Enable or Disable Publishing of Work Items in Microsoft Project.

To publish or refresh work items, follow the procedures in the next section.

Required Permissions

To perform these procedures, you must be a member of the Contributors group or have the View work items in this node and Edit work items in this node permissions set to Allow. For more information, see Team Foundation Server Permissions.

To refresh work items

  • In Microsoft Excel, on the Team tab, in the Work Items group, click Refresh.

    Note

    In Microsoft Project or Microsoft Office Excel 2003, use the Team menu.

To publish work items

See Also

Tasks

How to: Resolve Data Validation Errors in Microsoft Excel or Microsoft Project

How to: Update a Work Item List from a Query

How to: Connect a Work Item List to a Work Item Query

How to: Upload a Document in Team Explorer

How to: Upload or Save Documents to the Project Portal

How to: Add or Remove Columns in the Work Item List

Other Resources

Publishing and Refreshing Work Items