Etienne's VSTS World

So someone was bound to do it sooner or later... might as well be me ;-).

I got the new shinny Windows 2008 ISO from MSDN and install in a VM.  20 min later I was logging into W2k8.  Very nice.  I then add the IIS 7.0 feature and following the TFS install guide info about 2008 selected the proper added features

So far so good...

I then used my scripts to install SQL 2005, I got the incompatibility prompt for SQL 2005 RTM on Vista/Windows 2008 (why is there not a slipstream version of SQL 2005 SP2 yet I wonder) and selected to continue.  This installed fine and I applied SP2 on top of it.

So far so good...

Created 3 accounts, tfsservice, tfsreports and tfssetup, and added them to the administrators group.  You don't need to do that, logon locally would probably have been enough for tfsservice and tfsreports but I just put them all in the administrators group to be sure there wouldn't be any permission issue this first time around.

So far so good...

I put in the TFS dvd and run the setup, I get run through and put in the permissions for tfsservice, tfsreports and then... I get prompted for the URLs to where WSS is installed... But wait,  on W2K3, I get asked if I want to install WSS as part of the TFS install here (on W2K8) I don't... sigh... I exit setup.

I go and download Sharepoint 3.0 with SP1 from the microsoft download location and run the exe.... I don't have .net 3.0 installed...sigh..  Exit setup.

I add a new feature to W2K8 ... the .net 3.0 ... wait for it to install and then execute the Sharepoint Setup again.  This time it starts and again following the instructions in the TFS install guide I follow the 19 steps to a successful install in WSS 3.0 SP1...

Note: You need to run command lines to add permissions to the default web site... ughhh not a good User Experience.

Now back to TFS, again I run and put in my password and when I get to the WSS part it again prompts for the location I just put in the server and admin site (the default proposed actually) and the setup went fine.

Install the WSS extensions. Check

Install Team Build. Check

Install Team Explorer. Check

Create my first project. Check.

So all in all it installs fine on Windows Server 2008 but with a lot of manual steps... reminds me of ... oh ya 2005 and how difficult it was to install and how people where having issues.  The setup experience is very much streamlined in Windows Server 2003 but not so good in 2008.  So make sure you download the TFS install guide and follow the direction for installing pre-requisite on 2008.

Good luck

ET