Archives

Archives / 2006 / September

  • [Team System] Migrating Code From VSS to VS2005 and Team Foundation Server

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    UPDATE: I really, really recommend that you check out this GUI for VSSConverter at http://www.epocalipse.com/blog/2006/04/06/vssconverter-gui/ It was created by Eyal Post and it works like a charm! 

    We recently tried to migrate old VS2003 code from VSS to VS2005 and Team Foundation Server using the vssconverter utility that ships with Team System, and it worked pretty well... after a while.

    It's pretty straight forward if you follow the guideance on this page, http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms253060.aspx, but I really recommend you make sure the old code and VSS database is backed up first and that you try the migration to a test-project first.

    We set up a local VSS database on a client machine and moved (via archiving) the code to that local database first. Then we ran the analyze, test migration, tweaked the user mapping file and then finally kicked off the migration to the production TFS project. It worked without any major problems except that we had to be logged in as a user on the domain and with proper right to the team project. But it's all in the TFS documentation on MSDN... somewhere :D

    What may be somewhat itchy is the work you may get into after that, when you open up old solution and project files. It may be that VS2005 fails to load the old project files, but try to do a "get latest" and check out the .vbproj and .csproj files, then try to reload the projects. Good luck! 

    UPDATE: It looks as if the best way to open up a migrated solution is to locate the solution file in the Source Control Explorer window and double-click it. I will probably ask you to re-bind the projects, so do that and they should "connect" automatically. Make sure you have "Visual Studio Team Foundation Source Control" selected as your Source Control Plug-in in Tools->Options. It happens that the plug-in selection reverts back to VSS sometimes when the solution is opened.

  • Colibri Type Ahead

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    Jan-Erik says:
    I can't imagine how I managed before I installed Colibri. It's so super easy to start programs now. Just press CTRL+SPACE and write the program name. I rarely ever goes to the Start-menu anymore... It's really super.
    I just installed it myself and it's... cute!

  • [Team System] How to Delete a TFS Team Project

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    There are several ways to delete a TFS team project, but not via the Team Explorer. Steven Smith writes:

    If you need to delete a Team System Project you need to do it through a command line utility that is installed with Team Explorer.  In my case, I created a test project but wanted to also test project deletion.  There is no way to delete a project from Team System except through the command line tool, TFSDeleteProject.exe.  This utility is in the c:\program files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\IDE\ folder by default.  To delete a project, use the following syntax:

    TFSDeleteProject /server:ServerName ProjectName

    Julien Lavigne got a utility which does the same thing via a web service.

  • [Team System] How to Delete a TFS Build Type

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    Something I read on MSDN about deleting Build Types (because there's no obvious way to do it in the Team Explorer:

    To delete a build type
    1. On the View menu, click Other Windows and then click Source Control Explorer.
    2. In the Folder pane of the Source Control Explorer, locate the build type that you want to delete in the ${Team Project}\Team Build Types\{Build Type Name}\TeamBuild.proj tree. The build type is represented by the TeamBuild.proj file, but you need to delete the folder as well.
    3. With the desired build type folder selected, choose Delete from the shortcut menu. You will also need to check in the changes that were made to the directory. The build type entry is deleted and the action removes all underlying XML files.

    Good shortcut for how to manage Build Types in TFS -> Working with Build Types in Team Build 

    I also found good info about deleting build types on the Vertigo's Team System blog -> http://blogs.vertigosoftware.com/teamsystem/archive/2006/05/03/Deleting_Team_Build_Types_and_Team_Builds.aspx

     

  • [SQL] Using a Variable TOP Clause

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    This is a simple one, but still worth mentioning. Say you want to select a variable number of rows in a SELECT statement and don't want to use "dynamic SQL" to do that but rather use a SQL Parameter - no problems. In SQL Server 2005 you can type a query like this:

    SELECT TOP (@number) Title,Body,Author,Created,LastModified FROM Pages ORDER BY LastModified DESC

    Note that the parenthesis around @number is important, or you'll end up getting this error:

    Incorrect syntax near '@number'.

    If you're stuck with an older version of SQL Server, there are several ways to work around that problem. You could for example set the ROWCOUNT, as ROWCOUNT supports a variable:

    SET ROWCOUNT @number; SELECT Title,Body,Author,Created,LastModified FROM Pages ORDER BY LastModified DESC; SET ROWCOUNT 0

    A good place to look for SQL syntax information is here and here.

  • [Team System] Looking at Team Foundation Server

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    I've not been blogging that much lately - and for good reasons. I switched work a week ago, and many of you know how that is. Full speed ahead, lot of new info to dig into and new things to learn. It's been an inspiring week and it feels really good.

    Anyway, I've started to look more in detail at Team System and especially the Foundation Server parts. We plan to introduce it at work and really start using it to it's full extent with custom project templates and work items. I've been looking at most of the videos at TeamStudioRocks, and even though they are from the beta versions, that site is worth a visit or two. Other good websites for Team System and TFS related info is the Rob Caron blog and of course the Visual Studio Team System User Education (phew) blog.

  • My Cat Sponsored by Google?

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    Amazing... I was installing the trial version of Winzip 10 to zip up a bunch of files for a big backup and I was just about to uncheck the "install Google..." options because I already got the Windows Live stuff installed and it works pretty well. As I was reaching for that checkbox my cat jumps up on the table and hits Enter and starts to install everything. Now I got search deskbars and toolbars like everywhere... how useful... not.

    After I've uninstalled certain components I'm gonna have a talk with that cat.