How to link Team Iterations and Releases

In a case when you have multiple related projects running together you may want to coordinate them with cross-project Releases. When you have a team working on many projects in the same time, you may want to plan and organize work of the team with cross-project Team Iterations. We’ve added a relationship between Team Iterations and Releases in 3.13.0. A Team Iteration may be linked to any Release which is linked to the same Projects as work assigned to the Team Iteration. It’s also possible to use Team Iterations without linking them to Releases as before. Please do not use this new feature of Team Iterations along with standard Iterations as they are also linked to Releases.

Link within Assigned Work Items

It is possible to assign a work item such as User Story, Task, or Bug both to a Team Iteration and to a Release.

The figure below illustrates the setup. Team A works on two projects, Project X and Project Y. The team is assigned to both projects. Work of the team is organized with Team Iterations. Team Iterations #1, #2, #3 are assigned to the Team A. Work on the projects is coordinated using cross-project Releases. Releases #1, #2 are assigned both to Project X and Project Y. Team Iterations are not assigned to Releases. Every work item is assigned to a single Project, Release, Team, Team Iteration.

Link within Relations

For additional transparency, you can link Releases with Team Iterations either directly or within Relations. Add an outbound Relation from a Release to a Team Iteration to link them.

When Team Iterations are related to Releases, it is possible to visualize the connections and dates on a dedicated Roadmap view. On the view, the Team Iterations are displayed on the timeline according to their start and end dates. The Team Iterations are grouped by related Release. Start and end dates for the Releases are displayed within the lighter tone of the background color.

Here is how the view is configured. Team Iteration entity is selected as the cards. Inbound Relations are selected as horizontal lanes.

More information about the view:

• Roadmap view mode
• Manage Relations as Cards and Lanes on Views

Generate Team Iteration for Release

With 3.13.0 we've introduced the capability to generate Team Iterations for all the Teams assigned to Project(s) that participate in a Release.

More information about it:

• Team Iteration generation