FeatureSwitcher.VSTSConfiguration

A configuration plugin for FeatureSwitcher that stores FeatureFlags as WorkItems in VSTS.

Introduction

This project contains a .NET client library that is available thru NuGet. You can use the library to store FeatureFlag configuration for FeatureSwitcher as VSTS WorkItems.

Getting Started

1. Install the NuGet package

Install-Package FeatureSwitcher.VstsConfiguration

2. Add using directives

using FeatureSwitcher.VstsConfiguration;
using FeatureSwitcher.Configuration;

3. Now configure FeatureSwitcher to use your VSTS project

Features.Are.ConfiguredBy
    .VstsConfig()
    .WithVSTSUrl(new Uri("http://youraccount.visualstudio.com/yourproject"))
    .WithPrivateAccessToken("Your PAT token");

Note: This is just an example. You should never hardcode your PAT. Limit the access for the PAT to "Work items (read)" - or "Work items (read and write)" if you want to use the auto create feature - and store the token in a save place.

Click here if you need help how to create a private access token (PAT)

4. Run the code that checks your feature. It will automatically create the workitem in VSTS

Feature<MyDemoFeature>.Is().Enabled

The code will create a WorkItem of the type task by default and add a tag "FeatureFlag". The title of the task will contain the name of your feature (depending on your naming conventions). The value is stored in the description field.

5. Enter 'true' in the description field and save the WorkItem. Your feature flag is turned on now.

See the advanced concepts on how to customize the WorItems and support different environments.

Build and Test

The project is build on a private VSTS instance. The develop branch is automatically deployd to myget. The master branch is deployed to myget and after validation to nuget.

Branch	Status
master
develop

Contribute

If you are interested in fixing issues and contributing directly to the code base, please create an issue for every topic. Create pull requests only to develop branch.

To run the tests locally youe need a VSTS project. You shoud create a nw project to not mess up your workitems. Create a PAT token and store the token in a textfile named 'pat.secret'. Enter the URL to yur project to the app.config of the test project.

Advanced concepts

Environments

The solution supports the concept of environments. The environment is added as a separate tag to the WorkItem and allows multiple flags with the same name (normally it must be unique). Like this you can use the flag in Dev, Test, QA and Prod with different values.

Features.Are.ConfiguredBy
    .VstsConfig()
    .WithVSTSUrl(new Uri("http://youraccount.visualstudio.com/yourproject")
    .WithPrivateAccessToken("Your PAT token")
    .WithEnvironment("Dev");

Customize WorkItems and Queries

You can customize how the FeatureFlags are stored in VSTS. You can specify your own WorkItemType, the fields and the query that is used to retrieve them.

For example: you can create a new workitemtype called "FeatureFlag" and add fields to store the name and the value of the flag. You can add additional fields like priority and additional tags and expand the query to filter workitems based on these values.

This helps you organize your flags and allows multiple projects, environments, users etc. in one VSTS project.

var settings = new VstsSettings
{
    Url = new Uri("http://youraccount.visualstudio.com/yourproject"),
    PrivateAccessToken = "Your PAT token",
    WorkItemType = "FeatureFlag",
    NameField = "FeatureFlag.Name",
    ValueField = "FeatureFlag.Value",
    AdditionalQueryFilter = "and [System.Tags] Contains 'XYZ' and [Microsoft.VSTS.Common.Priority] = 1",
};

settings.AdditionalFields.Add("Microsoft.VSTS.Common.Priority", "1");
settings.AdditionalFields.Add("System.Tags", "XYZ");


Features.Are.ConfiguredBy
    .VstsConfig().WithSettings(settings);