Kevin.Gao.Blog()

Aug 21 2008

VSS / SourceSafe Tutorial

Welcome to my SourceSafe Tutorial. If you have any comments regarding this VSS tutorial, feel free to send me an email.

 

Navigation Links:
Chapter 0: SourceSafe / VSS How To Series Introduction
Chapter 1: SourceSafe / VSS Basics
Chapter 2: SourceSafe / VSS Operations
Chapter 3: Integrating SourceSafe with other IDEs
Chapter 4: SourceSafe / VSS administration
Chapter 5: Microsoft Source Code Control Interface (MSSCCI)
Chapter 6: SourceSafe / VSS automation (SDK)
Chapter 7: How Tos

 

Chapter 0: SourceSafe / VSS How To Series Introduction

SourceSafe / VSS is a version control tool used by many Windows developers. Before I started to work on SourceAnywhere for VSS… (more…)

 

Chapter 1: SourceSafe / VSS Basics

• What is SourceSafe?

Microsoft Visual SourceSafe, also called ‘VSS’, is a file-system-based source control tool from Microsoft… (more…) 

• Market Position of SourceSafe / VSS

As a member of Visual Studio product family, VSS is very popular among Windows developers. An IDC August 2004 ALM market report indicates… (more…)

• What can SourceSafe do?

In a nutshell, you can use VSS to keep your files, including the previous versions, in a central repository/database. Although VSS… (more…)

• Several Important Concepts in SourceSafe / VSS

VSS database/repository is the central place where all files, history, project structures, permission and user information are stored… (more…)

• Basic operations of SourceSafe / VSS

Add is the start point of all VSS file operations. Before you can do Get, Check In, Check Out or other operations, the file… (more…)

• Some Screenshots of SourceSafe / VSS

The following screenshots shows the typical interface of SourceSafe / VSS… (more…)

 

Chapter 2: SourceSafe / VSS Operations

• Working folder in SourceSafe / VSS

A working folder is the specified corresponding folders on a user’s local computer used to store files when working with VSS projects… (more…) 

• Add in SourceSafe / VSS

A file must be added in a VSS database first before you can do check in, check out and other operations. To add one or more files, you can… (more…)

• Get Latest in SourceSafe / VSS

The Get Latest Version command retrieves the latest or the pinned version of the files to our local disk. For pinned files… (more…)

• Check Out in SourceSafe / VSS

If we are checking out files (not a project), the Recursive and Build Tree options are not available. In VSS / SourceSafe 2005, we can check out… (more…)

• Lock-Modify-Unlock or Copy-Modify-Merge in SourceSafe / VSS

VSS supports two modes of work, Lock-Modify-Unlock and Copy-Modify-Merge. Lock-Modify-Unlock is the default style… (more…)

• File Diff in SourceSafe / VSS

File Diff is one of the important features that we use with a version control system. File Diff compares two files and shows the differences… (more…)

• File Merge in SourceSafe / VSS

File merge is the foundation of parallel development. Different team members can work on the same file at the same time and… (more…)

• Project Diff in SourceSafe / VSS

Project Difference compares two versions of a project and displays the comparison results. We can use it to see the differences… (more…)

• Share in SourceSafe / VSS

Share enables files to be shared among multiple projects. It creates share links among these projects, so that… (more…)

• Branch in SourceSafe / VSS

As we talked about in our last post Share, share is only a small function in VSS. It should be combined with Branch to play a greater role… (more…)

• Cloak in SourceSafe / VSS

Cloak is a useful little function in Visual SourceSafe. It allows us to specify the projects to be ignored during recursive operations such as… (more…)

• Label in SourceSafe / VSS

Visual SourceSafe allows you to define a label for a file or project version. A label is a short and concise description given for purposes of identification… (more…)

• Pin in SourceSafe / VSS

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… (more…)

• Show History in SourceSafe / VSS

Show History is one of the most important features in SourceSafe. My personal feeling is that being able to go back to… (more…)

 

Chapter 3: Integrating SourceSafe with other IDEs

• Using SourceSafe in Visual Studio 2005 & 2008

Visual SourceSafe can be integrated into Visual Studio to source control solution files, project files and application configuration files…(more…)

• Switching Visual Studio projects from SourceSafe to other SCC providers

If you previously used SourceSafe to source control your Visual Studio projects and then find a better source control tool, you may need to… (more…)

• Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with Visual C++ 6.0

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… (more…)

• Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with Visual Basic 6.0

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… (more…)

• Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with Access 2007

With Access Source Code Control add-in, Visual SourceSafe can be integrated into MS Access to source control Access queries, forms, reports, macros… (more…)

• Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with Access 2003

In previous article, I wrote about how to integrate SourceSafe with Access 2007. This time, I will write about integrating SourceSafe with Access 2003… (more…)

• Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with SQL Server 2008

Visual SourceSafe can be integrated with SQL Server Management Studio 2008 to facilitate team activities and enable parallel development… (more…)

• Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with SQL Server 2005

The Visual SourceSafe integration with SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) 2005 is virtually identical to SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) 2008… (more…)

• Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with Dreamweaver

Visual SourceSafe can be integrated into Dreamweaver to source control projects and files… (more…)

• Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with Flash

Visual SourceSafe can be integrated into Flash (Professional edition only) to source control projects. To use source control functions, we should… (more…)

• Integrating SourceSafe / VSS with PowerBuilder

PowerBuilder was a popular tool for database front end development. I used PowerBuilder 6 about 10 years ago to develop a MIS application… (more…)

 

Chapter 4: SourceSafe / VSS administration

• How to backup & restore SourceSafe / VSS database

SourceSafe provides an Archive utility, with which we can periodically backup our VSS Database or projects and transport files/projects…(more…)

• How to manage users in SourceSafe / VSS

Visual SourceSafe (VSS) users are based on VSS databases. When a VSS database is created, there will be two default users added to the database…(more…)

• How to Manage Security in SourceSafe / VSS

SourceSafe provides a tool, Visual SourceSafe Administrator, to manage the permission of the VSS users. However, designed for trusted environment…(more…)

 

Chapter 5: Microsoft Source Code Control Interface (MSSCCI)

• Introduction to Microsoft Source Code Control Interface (MSSCCI)

MSSCCI stands for Microsoft Source Code Control Interface. The latest version of MSSCCI is 1.3…(more…)

• Microsoft Source Code Control Interface (MSSCCI) Registry Entries

MSSCCI uses registry to organize multiple SCC providers. There are 3 elements in the registry…(more…)

• A Free Tool to Manage the MSSCCI Provider (with full Source Code)

Dynamsoft provides a tool called SCC Provider Manager with its SourceAnywhere product family…(more…)

 

Chapter 6: SourceSafe / VSS automation (SDK)

 

Chapter 7: How Tos

• How to version control SQL Server Stored Procedures using SourceSafe and Visual Studio 2003

SQL Server stored procedures can be added to Visual SourceSafe (VSS) for version control by using the source control feature in Visual Studio .NET 2003…(more…)

 

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

The Fastest SourceSafe Remote Access Tool Recommeded by Microsoft

23 responses so far

23 Responses to “VSS / SourceSafe Tutorial”

1. # Moonon 05 Nov 2008 at 2:00 am

   How about a Where to buy section?

2. # Bosson 09 Nov 2008 at 2:34 pm

   What about recover deleted item when delete from Visual Syudio, after recover from source safe i can’t retrive it to visual studio programs

3. # Kevin Gaoon 11 Nov 2008 at 7:58 am

   The file list is shown in Visual Studio according to the info in the project file. After recovering the file from SourceSafe, you need to add the file back to your Visual Studio project.

   Thanks.

4. # kirstyon 17 Dec 2008 at 5:33 pm

   May I know how to list out all the projects name in VSS?

5. # Kevin Gaoon 18 Dec 2008 at 11:22 am

   kirsty,
   Do you mean by program? If yes, please refer to this page:
   IVSSItem Members

   The Items property contains all the children of the current project. If you want to list all the projects, you need to go through all the projects recursively.

   Thanks.

6. # Kevin Gaoon 18 Dec 2008 at 11:32 am

   Boss,

   You need to re-add the deleted files to your Visual Studio project.

   Thanks.

7. # Venkateshon 18 Dec 2008 at 4:26 pm

   How to Integrate VSS with FLEXBuilder 3.0?

8. # sovit Guptaon 13 Jan 2009 at 4:14 pm

   How can i show code changes in last build

9. # Kevin Gaoon 19 Jan 2009 at 1:55 pm

   Sovit,

   Could you be more specific with your question? What do you mean by “build”, build in IDE or others?

   Thanks.

10. # Noyanon 03 Feb 2009 at 5:35 pm

    What happened to chapter 6?

11. # Al McNicollon 28 May 2009 at 6:05 am

    Thanks for the blog – nice to see someone supporting VSS after all the bad press it gets. We get it free as part of the BizSpark program, so I’m giving it a go.

    Do you know of any good resources for writing VSS plug-ins? I’m source-controlling a lot of binary .mdb files and have built a program that extracts the VBA code – it would be nice to integrate it seamlessly into VSS so that checking in an .mdb checks in the code files as well / instead.

12. # Kevin Gaoon 02 Jun 2009 at 9:08 pm

    Al McNicoll,

    Which version of Access are you using? I believe Access can integrate with VSS without any third-party pug-in.

    Thanks,

    Kevin

13. # arielon 15 Jun 2009 at 5:13 pm

    Hi Kevin,

    I am new to VSS and I found this website very interesting in terms of learning the step by step of VSS. I would like to ask if there is a PDF version of this site so that I can read it offline because my computer in the office doesn’t have internet connection and I can only read this while I am in home.

    Thanks,
    Ariel

14. # Sarvesh Bhardwaj › links for 2009-06-15on 15 Jun 2009 at 7:03 pm

    [...] » VSS / SourceSafe Tutorial (tags: sourcesafe tutorial howto programming .net development microsoft reference source safe guide vss) [...]

15. # Rickon 05 Aug 2009 at 6:12 am

    Kevin,

    Thank you so much for making this available to the public. I have used VSS sporadically over the years – never had to set it up myself until now. I figured reviewing a tutorial before I begin would be a good thing – glad I did.

    This was a great overview.

    R

16. # Jasonon 21 Aug 2009 at 5:08 am

    I just wanted to say thanks for the amazing tutorial. I have very little experience with VSS and I am trying to set it up in a small enviroment with only 2-3 developers, and this is exactly what I have been looking for. It’s short, simple, to the point, and answers all my questions.

    Thanks!
    Jason

17. # Timon 25 Sep 2009 at 7:05 am

    Thanks alot i have been looking for something like this to help me setup vss for myself and 2 other developers, short and sweet and to the point..
    Thanks again
    Tim

18. # Marcwolfon 19 Oct 2009 at 8:38 pm

    Do you have any information re using VSS over a internet connection.

    I am part of a smal team of developers who are not in the same office and we really need something like VSS to help us

    Marc

19. # Henrietteon 13 Nov 2009 at 6:29 am

    Hi Kevin,

    thanks for sharing your knowledge of VSS.

    Currently I’m looking for an answer to this problem:
    At work we have a running website. We have a production server and a test server. Customer support sometimes uploads new images to alter custom pages. These uploads are done through a different webapplication.
    Basically, so that customer support has no need to know anything about programming/servers/folders.

    Resently we added our sourcecode to VSS directly from the ISS on the testserver.
    Know, whenever customer support uploads a new image, we are unable to render the new image on the testserver.

    We think we need to remove the image folder from the VSS, but are afraid to end up deleting all images instead.
    Do you (or anyone else) have a suggestion for us as to how we can ensure that newly uploaded images are rendered correctly on both servers?

20. # Wildon 13 Nov 2009 at 10:12 am

    Kevin Gaoon, Al McNicoll, or anyone else:

    How can you write VBA code for Access 2003 to check files into and out of VSS?
    That is, not using VSS dialog boxes, but writing the code with VSS automation?

21. # Curiouson 27 Nov 2009 at 11:55 am

    Thanks for the tutorial. It was a good comprehensive overview. It would be nice to see some examples of the file structure for major releases, minor ones and test. Like you did in your branch example.

22. # Johnon 14 Jan 2010 at 7:34 am

    I want to print the full source safe documentation to my printer without opening every chapter. Is there a single button solution to do this?

23. # Priyaon 26 Jan 2010 at 9:57 pm

    Hi, How to use VSS from Client for web development projects

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