Creating and Working with Work Item Templates

You can use work item templates to reduce the number of fields that you must assign for a new work item because they are automatically populated from the values that you assigned to the template. For example, you can create a task template that will set the area path, iteration path, and discipline whenever you use it to create a task.

You can create a work item template by using the Copy Template URL feature in Team Web Access.

Note

You can create, apply, capture, and set default work item templates by using Work Item Templates, a power tool for Visual Studio. This tool is not supported. For more information, see the following page on the Microsoft Web site: Team Foundation Server Power Tools.

Required Permissions

To perform these procedures, you must be a member of the Contributors group or have your 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.

  1. In the quick launch area of the navigation pane for Team Web Access, click the New Work Item arrow, and then click an item on the All Work Item Types menu, such as Bug, Task, or Scenario.

  2. Assign values to each field that you want to have automatically defined by your template.

    Each required field has a shaded background.

    Note

    A caution icon appears on any tab that contains a value that violates a validation rule. You must correct the information before you can save changes.

  3. Click Copy Template URL.

    A message appears that indicates that the template URL was copied to the Clipboard.

  4. Click OK.

  5. Start Notepad and paste the contents of the Clipboard.

    This URL contains the specification of all fields that are defined in the work item form.

    You can save the URL as a text file or add the URL to a Web page as a hyperlink.

To use the work item template to create a work item

  1. Open a Web browser and copy the URL that you created in the previous procedure.

  2. Fill the remaining fields for the specific work item.

  3. Click Save & Close.

See Also

Tasks

Create a Work Item

Concepts

Tracking Bugs, Tasks, and Other Work Items