How to import task groups in Azure DevOps - azure

I have multiple release pipelines using similar set of tasks. I have created a task group as explained in Task Groups. I want to reuse this task group in other release pipelines.
I cannot find any task/menu item in Azure DevOps to do so. Documentation in Task Groups mentions exporting the release pipeline as json but the import section is not quite illustrative.

If you created a task group and you want to use it in another releases, just click on the + to add a task and in the search field start to type the task group name (for example TaskGroup1), then choose it:

I had the same issue and could not find my Task Groups. What fixed it was:
Under Pipelines, go to Task Groups. There you have an Import button where you can import the json Task Group file. When this is done, the Task Group became selectable when wanting to add a new Task.
Hope this helps :)

You need to search for the name of the Task group in the search box while adding a new task and not "task group".
If you created/imported a task group with name MyCar.FrontendApp, then in the search box for add a new task put "FrontendApp" and add that task.

In case someone else will have this issue and will come to this thread: even after import and save new task group may not appear under Add task section. In this case try to click Refresh link on the top - it should fetch all changes and update the cached tasks list:

Related

Azure Devops Dashboards table

I need to display a table that has the following. Please help
enter image description here
for each team member total number of hours worked on a bug or task group by user story
I am not sure where do you want to display this info, but DevOps offers you have some posibilities. First of all you can make a Query. There are inside Boards -> Queries. There you can build a query of whatever you need, PBI, Tasks, bugs, hours... The first time migth be a bit trickie, but you have several posibilities.
In adition if you want to have a pretier visualization, you can show this info in the dashbord, located in Overview -> Dashboards. There you add a new dashboard or edit an existing one, and add a new widget as the next picture:
Then you can configure the widget with the query you did. You must set the query as shared fore this.

How not to create duplicates in a task "Create work item" in azure devops

I have pipeline in azure devops. In this pipeline i use task "Create work item", how i can not to create duplicates with the same name ?
I use classic editor
You can add to duplicates parametr this value "System.Title" and duplicates not creates
How not to create duplicates in a task "Create work item" in azure devops
You could define an auto-incrementing variable for the name of the workitem.
In this case, the name of each created workitem will be accompanied by an auto-increment variable to distinguish it:
InternalWorkItemID 1
semanticWorkItemID $[counter(variables['InternalWorkItemID'], 0)]
The test result:
Besides, we could also define the 2022310 as variable and enable Settable at queue timeļ¼š
We could update the WorkItemTitle at queue the pipeline:
In this case, even if we forget to modify the name of the workitem, there is still a self-increment to distinguish.

Azure DevOps Pipeline - use same variable with distinct content for distinct task in same stage

I am creating a new pipeline for deploy multiple apps in azure devops, for sample:
I wanna make xml variable substitution for sample ConnectionString in web.config.
For sample:
But variables only can group by scope Stage and not by task in same stage, can I do this somehow?
Thanks in advance.
It is not supported to definite variables with the same name in same stage but different tasks. The document has mentioned the scopes of variables.
Custom variables can be defined at various scopes.
Share values across all of the definitions in a project by using
variable groups. Choose a variable group when you need to use the same
values across all the definitions, stages, and tasks in a project, and
you want to be able to change the values in a single place. You define
and manage variable groups in the Library tab.
Share values across all of the stages by using release pipeline
variables. Choose a release pipeline variable when you need to use the
same value across all the stages and tasks in the release pipeline,
and you want to be able to change the value in a single place. You
define and manage these variables in the Variables tab in a release
pipeline. In the Pipeline Variables page, open the Scope drop-down
list and select "Release". By default, when you add a variable, it is
set to Release scope.
Share values across all of the tasks within one specific stage by
using stage variables. Use a stage-level variable for values that vary
from stage to stage (and are the same for all the tasks in an stage).
You define and manage these variables in the Variables tab of a
release pipeline. In the Pipeline Variables page, open the Scope
drop-down list and select the required stage. When you add a variable,
set the Scope to the appropriate environment.
This maybe a workaroud to change the value of variable after one task.
Please refer to this issue: How to modify Azure DevOps release definition variable from a release task?

Trying to Schedule two processes at same time

I want to schedule two processes one after other after completion of first process the second process has to start.Any suggestions
The Blue Prism Scheduler can do just what you describe. First, open the Control tab, right-click on Schedules, and select New Schedule:
After configuring all the information on the next screen, you can then set up individual tasks (right click the new schedule and select New Task) in the Scheduler and configure one process to run after the other by setting the task's On Complete property properly.
This topic is covered extensively in Blue Prism official documentation. On the client portal, look for the "Blue Prism - Guide to the Scheduler" document.

Sharepoint Designer 2007 - Workflows and secondary workflow relationships

A little background: I work for a company that produces a product that has a workflow for projects with many "concurrently" running tasks. For this discussion, lets say that Project A creates 4 Sub-projects.
Both the main project and the 4 subproject workflows will create tasks in the main task list. The main issue that I am having is how to associate the tasks created by the subproject workflows back to the main project.
For instance:
Project A is created in the Projects list. This list has ONE workflow associated with it called "project start". This workflow is a manual start workflow which when started then creates the four subprojects in a subprojects list - these subprojects need to run concurrently hence why I have created them in a secondary list with their own workflows. The subprojects list has 4 workflows associated with it to manage the 4 subprojects - each of these "auto-start" when the subprojects are created in the subproject list.
So anyway, to save some typing I will refer to the subprojects as UNITS 1 - 4.
I create Project A and manually start it's workflow. The project start workflow creates the Unit 1, Unit 2, Unit 3 and Unit 4 items in the subproject list (at the same time because, as I said earlier, these items need to run concurrently). Each of the unit manager workflows start and begin creating their to-do tasks in the tasks list. I am using the "assign a to-do item" task activity because all I need to know for the workflow to progress through it's steps is whether or not the work is completed.
Once all 4 Unit workflows have completed, the Project Start workflow will now begin to manage the final portions of the project prior to completion with additional task items (manager approvals and so on).
Now the issue I am having is that the view I have set up for the task list shows the "title, start date, end date, completion status and link" columns. The link column shows a link that refers back to the creating list item. For this example, the Unit 1 manager workflow operates on the UNIT 1 item that was created by Project A. So for "example task 1" that was created by the unit manager workflow, the link is "Unit 1". This is not entirely helpful because when someone looks at their task list they could have multiple "example task 1"'s from multiple projects. Displaying UNIT 1 as the referencing master item means nothing to the user. What I want displayed is the Master Project title so that they can sort their tasks by project. Sorting by "Unit x" means nothing.
Now my initial solution was to create a "project" column on the task list. In this column, I could create another subworkflow that all it would do would be to look up the initially created project by looking up and referencing workflow and item id's and set this new "project" variable to the initiating master project (project a - for this example). That workflow WORKS!
However, and this seems to be an issue that is "not uncommon"in MOSS 2007, having this subworkflow running on the task list can (and has) created multiple lock errors which show - "this item cannot be modified as it is locked by an already running workflow". This error grinds the workflow to a halt and is not an error that is recoverable. I have researched this error and it is an unavoidable error that has no single and easily deployable solution. It has something to do with the backend databasing and how/when it stores the update task item variables and so on. Once the workflow locks, you're done.
So, what I really need is a clever solution to associate the main project with any and all subtasks. If the task is created by the "project start" workflow, that is done automatically because the "link" column auto-associates this task with the creating item...which in this case is "project a" - easy enough. However, because of my NEED for the additional subitems on a separate list with their own workflows.....I lose that reference.
Is there a way to associate the tasks created from the subproject list workflows to the main project without having to call another subworkflow to set that variable. (ie: a way to avoid the "this item is locked by a running workflow" problem).
I think I am thinking too hard on this solution and can no longer see the forest for the trees.
Unfortunately I think your solution is to stop using SharePoint Designer for this workflow. Either look into purchasing a 3rd-party workflow product for SP2007 or build a workflow feature in code using Visual Studio.
You want to get to a position where 1 workflow can do everything you're talking about: run on a project and create 4 parallel branches, each which create tasks exactly how you'd like (with a Project column) rather than the very limited options you have from SPD.

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