Bolstering its application lifecycle management platform, Microsoft has released Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Foundation Server Power Tools, intended to improve the Team Foundation Server user experience.Featured is a set of enhancements, tools and command utilities. Team Foundation Server offers services such as version control, work item tracking and build management. The Visual Studio 2008 software development platform was released in November. Microsoft previously has offered Power Tools for the predecessor Visual Studio 2005 platform. “We did not want to just deliver a warmed over version of the VS2005 Power Tools, so we included lot of new goodies in this release,” said Ed Hintz, a member of the Microsoft Visual Studio Team System team, in his blog.Among the new tools is a Find in Source Control tool that serves as an addition to the Team Explorer menu that provides the ability to locate files and folders in source control, Microsoft said. Files and folders are located by the item’s status or wildcard expression.Another new feature is the ability to open a selected folder in Windows Explorer straight from Team Explorer. Users can go straight to a mapped folder location from within Source Control Explorer. Tools installed in the package include: a command line tool, Team Explorer IDE menu additions, a new Build Notification tool, a Team Foundation Server Best Practices Analyzer, Process Template Editor, Work Item Templates and Custom Check-in Policies. The package is downloadable here. Software Development