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Pin is a small but sometimes helpful feature in Visual SourceSafe (VSS). VSS defines Pin as a marker that designates a specific version of a file. For example, if we want our team members to get a historical version by default, we can pin the file to the specific version.

Pin is not a native feature in SourceSafe. I usually do not use Pin very often and my personal recommendation is that we should avoid Pin if possible.

Pin has the following features:

• When we do Get Latest, for a pinned file, VSS retrieves the pinned version, not the latest version.
• We can still get the other versions in the Show History dialog box.
• After a file is pinned, the file cannot be modified. We cannot do Check In / Check Out on a pinned file.

To pin a version of a file, please follow steps below:

1. In Visual SourceSafe (VSS) Explorer, select the file that you want to pin.

2. On the menu Tools, click Show History, as seen in the following screen shot:

(Show History)

Or right-click the file that you want to pin, and select Show History.

(Show History)

3. In the History Options dialog box, click OK.

(History Options)

4. In the History of dialog box, select the version that you want to pin, and then click Pin. A pushpin icon will appear next to the pinned file.

(Pin)

The SQL Server-based Source Control Software Designed to be a SourceSafe Replacement

The Fastest SourceSafe Remote Access Tool Recommeded by Microsoft

Links:
Previous article <<<<: Label in SourceSafe / VSS
Next article >>>>: Show History in SourceSafe / VSS
SourceSafe How To series home page: VSS / SourceSafe Tutorial

Dynamsoft provides a tool called SCC Provider Manager with its SourceAnywhere product family. With this tool, you can choose one of the SCC providers in your system as the default provider. This is a screen shot of the tool:

(SCC Provider Manager)

With the permission of the company, I am posting the source code and the executable file here. The project was developed with Visual C++ 2003. Download SCC Provider Manager.

The SQL Server-based Source Control Software Designed to be a SourceSafe Replacement

The Fastest SourceSafe Remote Access Tool Recommeded by Microsoft

Links:
Previous article <<<<: Microsoft Source Code Control Interface (MSSCCI) Registry Entries
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SourceSafe How To series home page: VSS / SourceSafe Tutorial

SourceSafe provides an Archive utility, with which we can periodically backup our VSS Database or projects and transport files/projects between SourceSafe databases. SourceSafe also provides a Restore tool which allows us to restore the data from an archive.

• How to archive SourceSafe database
• How to restore SourceSafe database

To archive a SourceSafe database:

1. First, make sure no one is using the database we are going to archive or the Analyze utility will not run during the process of archive.

2. Open the database in SourceSafe Administrator and start the Archive Wizard through menu Archive -> Archive Projects.

3. Choose the project to archive from the project list.

(Choose project to archive)

4. Click Add to add more projects we would like to archive and then click Next.

(Add projects you would like to archive)

5. Specify a name for the archive file.

(Specify name for the archive file)

6. Specify the version range of the project to archive. We may choose to archive all of the data or archive the data older than a specific version.

(Specify the version range to archive)

7. Click Finish and SourceSafe will archive the projects to an .ssa file.

To restore the projects from an archive file:

1. Start the Restore Wizard through SourceSafe Administrator menu Archive -> Restore Projects.

2. Select the archive file that contains the projects we would like to restore.

(Select archive file)

3. Select the projects we want to restore to the database. We can check the Display subproject option to see all the subprojects.

(Select projects to restore)

4. Specify the destination to restore the project. We may restore the project to where it was archived from or to a different location.

(Select restore destination)

5. After the restore operation is finish, we may log in SourceSafe to check if the projects we want have been properly restored.

Note: If we want to restore a complete backup of a VSS DB, it is recommended that we restore the backup to a new VSS database rather than an existing database.

The SQL Server-based Source Control Software Designed to be a SourceSafe Replacement

The Fastest SourceSafe Remote Access Tool Recommeded by Microsoft

Links:
Previous article <<<<:
Next article >>>>: How to manage users in SourceSafe / VSS
SourceSafe How To series home page: VSS / SourceSafe Tutorial

PowerBuilder was a popular tool for database front end development. I used PowerBuilder 6 about 10 years ago to develop a MIS (Management Information System) application. The tool was powerful but in the past 5 years, PowerBuilder lost its ground to Java, .NET and other web development languages (like PHP). Recent market surveys show that PowerBuilder is not in the top 5 anymore.

The source code control interface of PowerBuilder is compatible with Microsoft’s MSSCCI, so we can use Microsoft Visual SourceSafe (VSS) or other compatible software as the version control tool.

To integrate Visual SourceSafe (VSS) with PowerBuilder, we can follow the steps below:

1. Right-click the selected workspace, and select Properties, as seen in the following screen shot:

(Properties of Workspace)

2. In Source Control tab, configure source control settings.

• In the Source Control System dropdown list, select Microsoft Visual SourceSafe.
• In User ID edit box, input the name of our VSS account.
• In Project edit box, input the VSS project in which we want put the selected local project. We can click the browse button next to choose the VSS project. When we click the browse button, the Log On to Visual SourceSafe Database window will prompt, as seen in the following screen shot:

(Log on to Visual SourceSafe Database)

• Log into the VSS database, and select a project to store the selected local project in the following screen shot.

(Add to SourceSafe)

• Click OK to finish the workspace binding.

3. In PowerBuilder System Tree, right-click the selected workspace, and select Add to Source Control to bring up the Add to Source Control window.

(Add to Source Control)

4. Click OK to add the selected items to the VSS database.

5. Now the target project is source controlled by VSS. We can perform the basic source control operations, such as Get Latest Version, Check Out, Check In, Undo Check Out, Add to Source Control, Show Differences, Show History and so on.

(Basic Source Control Operations)

The SQL Server-based Source Control Software Designed to be a SourceSafe Replacement

The Fastest SourceSafe Remote Access Tool Recommeded by Microsoft

Links:
Previous article <<<<:
Next article >>>>:
SourceSafe How To series home page: VSS / SourceSafe Tutorial

SourceSafe can be integrated into Visual Basic 6.0 to source control the VB forms, modules, class modules, etc.

To integrate SourceSafe with VB 6.0, we can do as follows:

1. Choose SourceSafe as the current source control provider.
For information on how to do it, refer to: http://www.kevingao.net/sourcesafe/microsoft-source-code-control-interface-msscci-registry-entries.html

2. Open VB 6.0 and check if the Source Code Control add-in is loaded through menu Add-Ins -> Add-In Manager.

If yes, we should be able to find the SourceSafe command under Tools menu.
If no, please edit the vbaddin.ini file by going to Start -> Run: vbaddin.ini and adding the line “vbscc=3 ” in the file.

3. Add the VB project into source control of SourceSafe by clicking menu Tools -> SourceSafe -> Add Project to SourceSafe.

(Add VB Project to SourceSafe)

4. In the following Log On to SourceSafe Database dialog box, enter the credentials to log on a VSS DB.

(Log on to VSS Database)

5. Choose a location in the VSS project tree to store the VB project.

(Choose location to place the VB project)

6. Select the files we want to add into SourceSafe for source control and click OK.

(Add VB files to SourceSafe)

7. Now, all of the files are under source control of SourceSafe. We can find the SourceSafe functions through menu Tools -> SourceSafe. We can also access some of the functions by right-clicking the file in the Project Explorer.

The SQL Server-based Source Control Software Designed to be a SourceSafe Replacement

The Fastest SourceSafe Remote Access Tool Recommeded by Microsoft

Links:
Previous article <<<<: Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with Visual C++ 6.0
Next article >>>>: Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with Access 2007
SourceSafe How To series home page: VSS / SourceSafe Tutorial

SourceSafe can be integrated into Visual C++ 6.0 to source control VC projects and files.

To integrate SourceSafe with VC 6.0, we can do as follows:

1. Choose SourceSafe as the current source control provider.
For information on how to do it, refer to: http://www.kevingao.net/sourcesafe/microsoft-source-code-control-interface-msscci-registry-entries.html

2. Add the VC project into source control of SourceSafe by clicking menu Project -> Source Control -> Add to Source Control. We can also add the project by right-clicking the file in the Project Explorer.

(Add VC project to SourceSafe from menu)

(Add VC project to SourceSafe)

3. In the following Log On to SourceSafe Database dialog box, enter the credentials to log on a VSS DB.

(Log on to VSS Database)

4. Choose a location in the VSS project tree to store the VC project.

(Choose location to place the VC project)

5. Select the files we want to add into SourceSafe for source control and click OK.

(Add VC files to SourceSafe)

6. Now, all of the files are under source control of SourceSafe. We can find the SourceSafe functions through menu Project -> Source Control. We can also access some of the functions by right-clicking the file in the Project Explorer.

The SQL Server-based Source Control Software Designed to be a SourceSafe Replacement

The Fastest SourceSafe Remote Access Tool Recommeded by Microsoft

Links:
Previous article <<<<: Switching Visual Studio projects from SourceSafe to other SCC providers
Next article >>>>: Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with Visual Basic 6.0
SourceSafe How To series home page: VSS / SourceSafe Tutorial