News
Microsoft Buys Tools Vendor DevBiz
Microsoft announced Monday it has bought out
devBiz
Business Solutions, which is known for producing tools for software development
and .NET developers.
The announcement came during the first day of VSLive,
Microsoft's Visual Studio conference being held in San Francisco.
DevBiz are the makers of TeamPlain
Web Access, a Web interface for Team Foundation Server that allows managing
work items, documents, reports and source control repositories.
"One of the most important aspects of VSTS [Visual Studio Team System]
is that it brings the power of Visual Studio to the entire development team,
providing tools for software architects, database professionals, testers and
project managers. However, there are countless other individuals who have
indirect roles in the development cycle that don't necessarily require the full
functionality of Visual Studio; they just need access to one piece of it: Team
Foundation Server," said Brian Harry, distinguished engineer on VSTS, in a
statement posted on Microsoft's site.
According to Harry, Web Access for Team System lets users access a numbe of capabilities -- such as sharing documents and
viewing source-control repositories -- through a Web interface
"With this acquisition, we can now offer both Windows and Web clients
for TFS, making it that much easier for users to participate in the development
lifecycle," Harry said. "In addition, the TeamPlain
client provides cross-browser access to a core subset of functionality within
TFS, making it even more appealing to a broader set of users."
Microsoft announced that TeamPlain Web Access is
now available as a free download to all Team Foundation Server customers, and
gave a partial roadmap of its intent for the acquisition.
TeamPlain Web Access will be re-released as Team
System Web Access as part of the Team Foundation Server Power Tools, the
company said in a statement. At a later date, the product will be integrated
into a future version of Visual Studio Team System.
Founded in 2001, Rochester, N.Y.-based devBiz
Business Solutions released version 1.0 of its TeamPlain
Web Access for Microsoft Team Foundation Server a year ago.
TeamPlain Web Access is available for free
download here.
About the Author
Stuart J. Johnston has covered technology, especially Microsoft, since February 1988 for InfoWorld, Computerworld, Information Week, and PC World, as well as for Enterprise Developer, XML & Web Services, and .NET magazines.