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With 6412 staff, iGATE optimizes technology and operations to pass business critical benefits to customers, like business process improvement, greater operational efficiency, higher productivity, improved response time and greater profitability. The company however, sought a comprehensive source control application to manage software development projects. Seeking a solution, the company deployed Microsoft® Visual Studio® 2005 Team Foundation Server, a change management tool that integrates source control, work item tracking, and reporting into one consolidated platform. As a result of this implementation, everyone shares a single, integrated source control system and collaboration server. Today, 3000 employees connect to the Team Foundation Server daily.
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| Situation |
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iGATE (Nasdaq: IGTE) is the first outsourcing solutions provider to offer a
business outcome based pricing model through a fully integrated technology and
operations (iTOPS) structure with global service delivery. iGATE works with
clients to optimize their businesses, secure substantial and sustainable
year-on-year cost benefits, tie costs to business needs and results.
iGATE provides IT consulting; application development and maintenance;
infrastructure management data warehousing; business intelligence solutions;
ERP/ enterprise solutions; BPO/business service provisioning; independent
verification and validation; KPO and contact center services.
The company has been assessed at CMMI Level 5, Six Sigma methodologies and is
COBIT, ISO 9001 and ISO 27001 certified, ensuring the highest levels of quality
and data security. iGATE has 8 offices in 12 countries and manages global
delivery centers in Mexico, Australia, and India.
Like most software development organizations, source code control is important
for iGATE. Source code control allows developers to check source code in or out
of a central repository, giving them the ability to work on the same project
without worrying about lost or deleted code or changes that have been
overwritten. Essentially, source code control lets developers manage their files
through the entire development lifecycle.
In the past, iGATE was using Microsoft Visual SourceSafe® 6.0 for source control
management. However, the lack of an integrated tool set to support the company’s
application lifecycle management strategy presented several problems. Specific
problems included: lack of centralized management, security concerns,
consolidation of the data into fewer servers, hard disk space management and
administration overheads.
iGATE was eager to find a solution to its needs. “We were frustrated with our
current way of doing things and were willing to take a risk on something new,”
says Vijay Gurumurthy, Senior Manager IT, iGATE. “We needed a comprehensive,
enterprise-class solution for managing all aspects of the development process.”
iGATE decided that it needed a new source control application to manage software
development projects across platforms be it Java, J2EE, Eclipse or Microsoft;
and keep pace with the company’s growth rate.
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When we implemented Visual Studio Team System, we noticed immediate process improvement through automation. It reduces the administrative burden and reduction in administration efforts leads to significant cost savings of 55 percent.
Chella Namasivayam M
Vice President IT & IS, iGATE.
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| Solution |
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In its search for a collaboration software solution, iGATE considered several
tools, including Microsoft Team Foundation Server, IBM Rational ClearCase, MKS
Implementer, and CVS (Concurrent Versions System).
After an in-depth comparison of these, iGATE chose to deploy Microsoft® Visual
Studio® 2005 Team Foundation Server, a collaboration server that offers a number
of functions including source code control, work-item and issue tracking,
integrated process guidance, project health, and status reporting.
Enhancing the Developer Environment with Team Foundation Server
“We selected Team Foundation Server because of its tight integration, built-in
bug tracking capability, ease of reporting, and cost-effectiveness,” remarks
Vijay Gurumurthy. “We felt that Team Foundation Server was a fully integrated
solution to adopt and use. It was a clear winner.” It enables everyone on the
team to collaborate more effectively and deliver better quality software.
Additionally, TFS provides a central repository for data, and gives developers
visibility of all aspects of the development life cycle.
The decision to implement the new solution was based on the following reasons:
• Enables more effective team communication and collaboration
• Maximizes individual productivity, at the same time helping to ensure that the
efforts of each team member remain well defined and aligned with the team’s
overall priorities
• Includes integrated process templates to help teams deliver predictable
results, continuously improve and adapt
• Helps development teams define, adopt, and enforce consistent processes
• Provides single console to IT administrators
• Provides remote access to onsite users to collaborate with offshore team
Transitioning from Visual Source Safe to Team Foundation Server
Team Foundation Server provides a VSSConverter tool to migrate existing source
files maintained in a Visual Source Safe (VSS) database to TFS source control
server. This TFS converter tool helps with the migration of files, folders,
version history, labels, and user information.
The transition from Visual Source Safe to TFS was smooth, all because of the
availability of free migration tools. iGATE set about migrating all digital
assets from Visual Source Safe to Team Foundation Server including data and
source code. All this was possible in less than 11 months.
During the transition phase, VSS and TFS systems were running in parallel.
Important activities during this phase were migration of data, training users,
and aligning business processes accordingly.
When iGATE implemented Visual Studio Team System 2005 Team Foundation Server, it
expanded its use beyond just source-code control to include bug tracking, the
management of work items assigned to developers, and the management of unit
tests and load tests, all of which are stored in the same repository for easy
access, correlation, and reporting. “Today, with Team Foundation Server, we can
manage and track work items. It has helped a lot because we can now easily
associate a work item with checked-in code, and its reporting features give us
great real-time visibility into project status,” says Vijay Gurumurthy.
Cross-Platform Support through Teamprise
iGATE has a large number of .NET and Java developers. In order to increase the
productivity of the Java developers and to provide the same user experience as
the .NET teams, iGATE deployed the Teamprise Client Suite from Teamprise, a
Microsoft Certified Partner. Teamprise is a suite of client applications for
accessing Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server from outside of the
Visual Studio Integrated Development Environment (IDE). Teamprise enables
software development teams to use the source control, work item tracking, build,
and reporting features of Team Foundation Server from within the Eclipse IDE,
and from other operating systems, including Linux and Mac OS X.
Using the Teamprise Client Suite in conjunction with Visual Studio Team System,
enterprise companies can now standardize on the use of Microsoft's Team
Foundation Server for the Application Life-Cycle Management needs of both their
.NET and Java development teams. With Teamprise, iGATE has seamless access to
Team Foundation Server, including version control, build management, work-item
tracking, planning, and reporting from Eclipse.
Solution Overview
iGATE designed a dual tier architecture with dedicated TFS APP tier and TFS DB
Tier along with TFS Server Proxy. The solution was implemented at the Bangalore,
Chennai, and Hyderabad offices. The features implemented were source control,
work item tracking, build management, test automation, and reporting. It was
customized to build selective project backup solution to backup and restore
specific projects.
Vijay Gurumurthy says, “With Team Foundation Server we have one consolidated
development environment and we no longer have to open a new environment to look
at files or use version control. All we need is Team Foundation Server source
control.”
He adds, “Choosing Team Foundation Server was the right choice as it helped us
in building a better architecture and provided a cost effective solution. The
technology contains many improvements and features that help us optimize our
business applications. It helped us to analyze and enhance our existing
development processes.”
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| Benefits |
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iGATE now has enhanced capabilities that make it easier for teams to work
together, which has led to increased productivity. A central repository for
source code, work items, builds and process led to better development practices
amongst the project teams which eventually increased the overall productivity of
the delivery teams.
“The solution has delivered all the benefits we wanted,” says Vijay Gurumurthy.
“The capabilities provided by adopting Team Foundation Server that are enabling
us to work more closely together and maximize our potential as a team.”
Reduces Administration Efforts
iGATE has significantly reduced its administration efforts with Team Foundation
Server and repository consolidation. The solution allowed iGATE to carry out
project management, source version management, modeling and testing under a
single development environment. The company now has a change management tool
that integrates source control, work item tracking, and reporting in one
consolidated environment. With real-time visibility and up-to-date record of
issues such as bugs or coding errors, administrators can track the progress of
the development process in real time. This resulted in a large cost reduction
for software quality management, configuration management, and purchase of test
tools.
The solution has also made it possible to meet the challenges posed by the
company’s existing systems, bringing together data from diverse sources for easy
accessibility.
With the new solution’s transparency, the IT team can identify key areas of
need. For example, administrators can now see areas which have an urgent
requirement. This helps them to provide for these needs and increase the quality
of service they deliver.
“When we implemented Visual Studio Team System, we noticed immediate process
improvement through automation,” says Chella Namasivayam M, Vice President IT &
IS, iGATE. “It reduces the administrative burden and reduction in administration
efforts leads to significant cost savings of 55 percent.”
Provides Better Integration
Using Team Foundation Server, iGATE has full integration between its development
environment, source control, and additional features that accompany the
development process, such as work items and reports. Team Foundation Server
contains a tightly-integrated shared data source which allows bug rates, work
item status, and workflow metrics to be maintained in real time, available in
reports.
Team Foundation Server also allows developers to create a variety of reports
based on the combined data for work items, change sets, and other components.
Provides Better Version Management
Team Foundation Server helps in simultaneous checkouts, branching, and merging
of the codes, which helps developers manage multiple revisions of the source
code, as well as other documents, and work items related to the project.
Provides More Transparent and Controlled Processes
Integrated process workflows, version control, work-item tracking, and other
features in Team Foundation Server provide the transparency necessary to improve
control of code, project artifacts, and processes.
Reporting and business intelligence tools in Team Foundation Server automate and
simplify tracking and reporting of project status, performance, and quality
metrics.
Having real-time information helps everyone contribute to the team’s goals.
Managers and leads appreciate the ability to access information and view it in a
consistent way, whether it’s for the Java team or for developers working in the
.NET Framework. This leads to a single consolidated software configuration
management (SCM) solution for the entire organization.
Provides Better Hardware Utilization
Reduction in disk space led to better hardware utilization. Consolidation of
data reduced the number of servers to manage.
Enhances Security
Team Foundation Server supports multiple simultaneous check-outs, branching and
merging capabilities, and the ability to set security levels on any source tree
level.
“While we were looking for a solution, we found that the security and
collaboration features of Team Foundation Server were unique,” says Vijay
Gurumurthy.
Microsoft Visual Studio 2005
Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 is the world’s most popular development environment
for designing, developing, and testing next-generation Windows-based solutions
and Web applications and services. By improving the development experience for
Windows, the Web, mobile devices, and Microsoft Office, Visual Studio 2005 helps
organizations deliver a variety of solutions more productively than ever before.
Visual Studio Team System expands the product line with new software tools that
enable greater communication and collaboration throughout the development life
cycle. With Visual Studio 2005, businesses can deliver modern service-oriented
solutions more efficiently.
For more information about Visual Studio 2005, go to:
www.msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio
For More Information
For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft
Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada
Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of-hearing
can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in the
United States or (905) 568-9641 in Canada. Outside the 50 United States and
Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information
using the World Wide Web, go to:
www.microsoft.com
For more information about iGATE products and services, call +1 412 787 2100 or
fax +1 412 494 9272, toll free number 877 92 iGATE/ 877 924 4283 6528 or visit
the Web site at: www.igate.com
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| Solution Overview |
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| Company |
| iGATE.
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| Industry |
| Information Technology / Information Technology Services |
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| Industry Size |
| Large |
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| Customer Profile |
| iGATE is an IT services, consulting and process outsourcing company focused on providing customers Integrated Technology and Operations (iTOPS) solutions. |
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| Business Situation |
| iGATE needed a solution that would provide centralized management, security, consolidation of the data into fewer servers, and reduce administration overheads. Additionally, it wanted a scalable and cost effective solution that could provide bug tracking, build management, process enactment, collaboration, and reporting capabilities for both .NET and Java development teams. Finally, it wanted a system that provides process automation to increase transparency, efficiency and productivity. |
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| Solution |
| iGATE deployed Microsoft® Visual Studio® 2005 Team Foundation Server across the enterprise. |
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| Benefits |
• Reduces administration efforts
• Provides better integration
• Provides better version management
• Provides more transparent and controlled processes
• Provides better hardware utilization
• Enhances security |
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| Software and Services |
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Developer Tools |
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Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2005 |
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Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 2005 |
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| Hardware |
• Single Tire: 2 * Dual-Core Intel(R) Xeon(R) 5140, 4 GB Memory
• Dual Tire:
− 2 * Dual-Core Intel(R) Xeon(R) 5140, 4 GB Memory
− 2 * Dual-Core Intel(R) Xeon(R) 5140, 8 GB Memory, DB Server |
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| Partner |
| None |
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| "Choosing Team Foundation Server was the right choice as it helped us in building a better architecture and provided a cost effective solution. The technology contains many improvements and features that help us optimize our business applications. It helped us to analyze and enhance our existing development processes."
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Vijay Gurumurthy
Senior Manager IT, iGATE.
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