Finding Bugs, Tasks, and Other Work Items
To track the status of a work item or the progress of an iteration or release, you can define and run a work item query. You can use the query editor in Team Web Access and Team Explorer to define filter criteria. The query results appear as a list or a tree view of work items.
Finding a list of work items
.png "Task sequence for finding work items")
From the query results view you can perform any of the following tasks:
Open a work item.
Create a work item that is automatically linked to a selected work item.
View a multi-tiered, hierarchical tree of work items that are associated by tree links.
View a two-tiered set of top-level work items and those work items that directly link to them.
In Team Explorer, you can also change linked associations by using the drag and drop operation within a direct links or tree view.
Export the query results to or open the query results within Microsoft Excel or Microsoft Project, make modifications, and then publish the updated items back to Team Foundation Server.
Open the query results within Microsoft Excel to generate work item reports.
Export the query results to Office Outlook and e-mail them.
Print or share the query results with other team members.
Common Tasks
In the following table, select the content that supports your ability to find work items or manage the query results list:
Task |
Related topics |
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Find a single work item. Look up a work item based on its ID, and find work items based on a keyword or phrase. |
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Find a list of work items. Generate a list of work items by using the query editor to define the filter criteria. Based on the type of query you use, you can view a flat list of work items or a hierarchical list that illustrates dependencies. |
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Define and refine search criteria. All work item queries consist of one or more query clauses. Each clause is comprised of a field, an operator, and a value. You create and modify queries by adding, removing, modifying, and grouping as many clauses and fields as you need to generate the filtered set of work items that meet your needs. |
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Create a query from selected work items. You can generate a query that contains the work item IDs of a selected group of work items. This is often useful when you want to create links from one work item to a group of work items. |
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Manage and share your work item queries. You can create, save, copy, and rename work item queries. You can maintain a private set of queries or share them with other team members. |
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Add and sort query results. You can add column fields to the query results so that you can view additional information about each work item. You can sort the list of work items so that they are grouped in meaningful ways. |
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Export work items to Office Excel or Office Project. You can export work items to Office Excel and Office Project to use the features of those programs. You can use Office Excel to perform bulk updates to column fields, to augment a task break down structure, to upload additional work items to an existing team project, or to generate a report based on a work item query. You can use Office Project to manage tasks and project schedules. |
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Print query results. You can print a single work item or list of work items. |
Related Tasks
You can use work item queries and query results to share information, generate reports, and efficiently create associations among work items. In the following table, select the content that supports the task of interest:
Task |
Related topics |
|---|---|
Share work items with other team members. You can share work items, work item queries, and query results with other team members by using E-mail, query folders, or posting a hyperlink. |
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Create links from one work item to multiple work items. If you want to associate work items, you can open a work item query and select the items that you want to link to. |
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Create reports. You can communicate progress of iterations and releases by creating reports from query results. |