Visual Studio Online Update Adds Pull Requests -- Visual Studio Magazine

Visual Studio Online Update Adds Pull Requests

The feature, which is for code stored in Git, will eventually be added to local copies of Visual Studio.

By Keith Ward
06/13/2014

The latest release of Visual Studio Online is out, and the big new feature is pull requests for Git code repositories.

Microsoft Technical Fellow Brian Harry announced the news on his blog. Pull requests act like Team Foundation Version Control, allowing a developer to make changes in a private branch of code and have those changes merged into another branch. "That workflow enables a code review experience with back and forth discussions of the changes, refinements if the changes need updates, etc.," Harry wrote.

The feature is "so fundamental" to Git, Harry said, that it's being made available to anyone with a Visual Studio Online license, including the free Basic version. He added that the functionality will be added to the on-premises version of Team Foundation Server (TFS) in the future.

Developers will find the new feature under the Code tab for any project utilizing Git. It's called "Pull Requests", and is activated by selecting "New Pull Request."

Visual Studio Online reached general availability last April. It's Microsoft's cloud-enabled version of TFS. The free, Basic version allows up to five developers to collaborate.

About the Author

Keith Ward is the editor in chief of Virtualization & Cloud Review. Follow him on Twitter @VirtReviewKeith.

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