Comparing developer productivity tools
I am getting ready to test developer productivity tools for our team (Coderush, Resharper, JustCode,  etc).  We're planning to roll the tool out the same time as we deploy Visual Studio 2010 and TFS.

I've seen several posts discussing the merits of one tool versus another.  However, I haven't been able to find any discussion of a methodology self evaluating.  One approach I've seen is to use each tool for a month or so and decide which one you like best.  This seems completely reasonable if I were evaluating it for myself, but since I'm evaluating for others as well, I'd like to do something more rigorous.  I'm hoping to collect some ideas on how to do that.

As a starting point, my thinking was to come up a list of 10-20 crucial features to compare, then prepare a matrix where I can compare the relative strengths of each product.  Once the matrix is complete, we can make a well informed decision about which product aligns with out needs.  Since I'm not a user of any product now, it's been difficult to figure out which features are critical and which are less so.

Thank you!


Comparing developer productivity tools
===

I am getting ready to test developer productivity tools for our team (Coderush, Resharper, JustCode,  etc).  We're planning to roll the tool out the same time as we deploy Visual Studio 2010 and TFS.

I've seen several posts discussing the merits of one tool versus another.  However, I haven't been able to find any discussion of a methodology self evaluating.  One approach I've seen is to use each tool for a month or so and decide which one you like best.  This seems completely reasonable if I were evaluating it for myself, but since I'm evaluating for others as well, I'd like to do something more rigorous.  I'm hoping to collect some ideas on how to do that.

As a starting point, my thinking was to come up a list of 10-20 crucial features to compare, then prepare a matrix where I can compare the relative strengths of each product.  Once the matrix is complete, we can make a well informed decision about which product aligns with out needs.  Since I'm not a user of any product now, it's been difficult to figure out which features are critical and which are less so.

Thank you!

