Upgrading TFS 2008 Workgroup to TFS 2008 Standard

About a month ago I was assigned the task of learning how to build and maintain a team foundation server. To avoid the costs of purchasing licenses for a software we were only testing for a production environment, we decided to use our MSDNAA copy for our test. Incidentally, the version MSDNAA distributes to schools is the workgroup edition.

After the build was completed, I decided that Microsoft's Visual Studio Team Foundation Server would do everything (and more) that we needed. Due to legal restrictions, I couldn't/shouldn't use the MSDNAA license for a production environment. Additionally, the workgroup license for TFS only supports five users, hardly enough for my team's purposes.

Naturally I wanted to avoid have to reinstall Team Foundation Server since simply inserting the new license key would be the easiest thing to do, if the software supported it. I searched around the web for a bit and found a Microsoft article on upgrading from workgroup to standard, but it was for TFS 2005. None-the-less, it was worth a shot. Coicidentally, it was not too far off. Here's how I upgraded my copy and a problem I ran into in the process.

If you go into your Programs and Features (if you're using Server 2003 go to Add or Remove Programs) on your server that TFS is isntalled on, double click the uninstaller for Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Team Foundation Server ENU(assuming your copy is English). On the window that comes up you should see an option at the bottom to upgrade to Team Foundation Server. Check that radio button and enter the new license key you have and click Next. You * see a window that says upgrade was successful.

The problem I had with this method was that when I checked the radio button, the license key text boxes remained greyed out. When I clicked Next, hoping to see a place to input the new license key, I was met with a screen that said my upgrade was successful, though it wasn't.

Insert/mount your Team Foundation Server disk/image and run the installer. It should give you options to repair, uninstall, or upgrade. In my case, the upgrade option automatically showed the license key for my disk. I selected that option, clicked Next, and my edition was upgraded to TFS standard.

Tada!