The mixed tool sets used by developers at Flextronics hindered productivity, quality assurance, and reporting. The company addressed those issues by moving to Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 as an integrated solution for the application lifecycle—from managing and testing code to reporting on project status. Flextronics is benefiting from increased productivity and collaboration, better visibility into project status, and increased software quality.
Business Needs
Flextronics provides end-to-end design, engineering, and manufacturing services to original equipment manufacturers across a range of industries. The company has three software development groups within its corporate IT organization—IT Factory Operations, IT Finance, and IT Engineering and Design—encompassing some 63 developers, quality assurance (QA) personnel, and other development team members in more than a half-dozen countries.
A year ago, Flextronics had a mixed tool set for application lifecycle management. For example, the IT Factory Operations group used the Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Professional Edition development system for development, Apache Subversion for source code control, Bugzilla and Micro Focus QADirector for bug tracking, and XPlanner to track tasks. IT Finance used Visual Studio 2008 Professional for development, Subversion and Microsoft Visual SourceSafe version control software for source code control, and spreadsheets to track bugs and tasks.
For the development teams, having a mixed tool set presented problems. “Developers wasted time switching among tools throughout the day,” says Roger Yang, Senior Staff Business Analyst in IT Factory Operations. “Collaboration was poor—especially between development and QA personnel, who used different tools. This resulted in lengthy QA cycles and the need for extensive manual communication and coordination. In addition, leads and managers had limited visibility into project status, knowing only what they tracked manually.”
Solution
Flextronics is addressing its application lifecycle management needs by upgrading to Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate with MSDN and adopting Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 2010 as an integrated solution for source code control; requirement, work item, and bug tracking; and reporting. The company also is adopting Microsoft Visual Studio Lab Management 2010 and using the Microsoft Test Manager technology in Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate and Visual Studio Test Professional 2010 with MSDN to manage test cases, capture test data, record and replay tests, and manage test lab environments.
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We’re seeing a 20 to 30 percent productivity gain with respect to quality assurance–related processes, such as testing and bug fixing. |
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Jorge Rodriguez Brizuela
Development Supervisor, IT Finance, Flextronics |
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Evaluation of Visual Studio 2010 began in July 2009, when Flextronics personnel spent time at a Microsoft Technology Center. Also present was Steven Borg from Northwest Cadence, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner that assisted Flextronics with its initial adoption of Team Foundation Server through both training and consulting. “We left the Microsoft Technology Center really excited about Visual Studio 2010,” says Yang. “What really caught our attention were the testing capabilities—essentially, everything we needed to bridge the gap between development and QA.”
The IT Factory Operations development group originally implemented Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Foundation Server and is now upgrading to Team Foundation Server 2010. “Implementation was easy, as was customizing the solution to support the way that we work,” says Yang. “We’re now using Team Foundation Server for source code control, work item and bug tracking, and reporting. Developers are moving to Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate, quality assurance personnel will use Visual Studio Test Professional 2010, and we’ll deploy Visual Studio Lab Management 2010 to replace QADirector. We also really like the SketchFlow feature in Microsoft Expression Studio 3 design software, which we get through our MSDN subscription and are using to build screen mockups for feedback.”
The IT Finance development group has already adopted Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate, Team Foundation Server 2010, and Test Professional 2010. “We’ve already done six projects using Visual Studio 2010, which has enabled us to successfully bridge the gap between development and quality assurance,” says Jorge Rodriguez Brizuela, Development Supervisor for the group.
Benefits
By moving to the integrated set of tools provided by Visual Studio 2010, Flextronics is optimizing development team output. Key benefits include:
Increased productivity and collaboration. Developers and QA personnel are more productive, no longer using as many tools or communicating using inefficient methods. “We’re seeing a 20 to 30 percent productivity gain with respect to quality assurance–related processes, such as testing and bug fixing,” says Brizuela. “With everyone using the same tools, fewer issues fall through the cracks, code rework is reduced, and reporting is more efficient—all of which help increase team output.”
Better visibility into project status. With project data collected automatically and stored in one location, Flextronics has much greater visibility into project status. In addition, the time that managers and leads spend collecting information has decreased. “In the past, managers spent one day a week collecting data and producing reports with limited information,” says Yang. “Today, they may spend an hour a week on reporting, and the reports are much richer. Just as important, we now have the wherewithal to continually measure and improve.”
Increased code quality. Flextronics has new tools at its disposal to improve code quality. “Capabilities provided by Microsoft Test Manager are helping us find bugs earlier in the development process, rather than during user acceptance testing,” says Brizuela. “We’re just starting to explore and take advantage of the code quality tools in Visual Studio 2010, such as those for static code analysis, and expect to realize further quality improvements as we begin using features such as automated unit testing and build verification upon code check-in.”
Overall, the company’s adoption of Visual Studio 2010 has been well worth the effort. “Visual Studio 2010 is a ‘lean IT’ enabler, says Yang, referring to principles that aim to eliminate work that adds no value to a product or service. “The way that Visual Studio 2010 is making people more productive and streamlining processes is enabling us to do more projects.”
For more information about other Microsoft customer successes, please visit:
www.microsoft.com/casestudies
