Microsoft Visual SourceSafe: Product Overview
The Version Control System for Development Teams Using Visual Studio .NET
Visual SourceSafe 6.0c is the ideal version control system for any development team using Microsoft Visual Studio® .NET. Historically, problems within the team development environment stem from the inability to work comfortably in a setting sensitive to their projects and source code. While every project requires an adequate level of software management, the costs and overhead associated with file-based version control often outweigh the benefits. By providing project-oriented software management, Visual SourceSafe enables teams to develop with the confidence that their projects and files will be protected. It's simple enough to use right out of the box, and it's integrated with the development environment developers already work in.
Integrated features of Visual SourceSafe enable developers to access the full power of team development features-all from within the familiar Visual Studio environment they already use. Many features trigger automatically, such as when a file is about to be changed, providing a safety net for team members and ensuring the protection of the project.
Visual SourceSafe also provides an extensive feature set designed to save time and money through reliable source code control. It enables development teams to automatically protect and track their most valuable source code, documentation, binaries, and all other file types as they change throughout the software life cycle. For example, check in and check out file locking securely protects files from accidental overwrite by preventing more than one user from modifying the same file at once.
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Versioning features, such as labels, provide snapshots of a project for the quick retrieval of any previous version in the software life cycle. Difference reporting provides quick access to changes across separate versions of the same file, enabling developers to know immediately what lines of code have changed.
Share and linking capabilities promote the reuse of code and components across projects and simplify code maintenance by propagating changes across all shared and linked files whenever a file is updated.
Parallel development features, such as branching, enable teams to fork the development process into parallel projects and files, creating identical copies that inherit all versioning documentation but may be tracked as new, individual projects. Team members can also reconcile conflicts between different versions of the same file by using a visual merge capability, which provides a point-and-click interface for uniting files and avoids potential loss of valuable changes. As revisions are made, files are added and modified, and the software life cycle grows, all changes and documentation are secured by Visual SourceSafe, providing an audit trail for every file and every project, easily accessible to even the novice user.
Visual SourceSafe also provides many advanced features for Web site management, including extensive deployment support. Additionally, Visual SourceSafe can be used to create site maps and check hyperlinks, enabling a deeper degree of software reliability.
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Developers can use Visual SourceSafe quickly and effectively without extensive training or maintenance. The simplified setup process enables installation, configuration, and user setup in minutes, all with effortless administration. Additionally, administrators can select among five levels of permissions for users and can define authorization at the project or user level.
Network performance is optimized for LANs, integrating effectively with the environment in place. Application performance scales with hardware, taking full advantage of the capabilities of the environment. In addition, the load performance of the Visual SourceSafe features integrated within Visual Studio .NET is up to twice as fast as earlier versions of Visual Studio. Visual SourceSafe even provides the Analyze tool for ensuring the integrity and reliability of every project database.
Whether working from the stand-alone SourceSafe Explorer, from the command line, or even in the Visual Studio .NET integrated development environment (IDE), Visual SourceSafe provides the features every team member needs to use, and in a way that fits with their development needs. The ability to store, document, version, and track any file of any type provides an extremely flexible environment that can adapt to any development setting, including design, development, testing, and debugging.
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