I have tried to collect here a complete list of every third party SourceSafe product, tool, utility, add-in and resource on the planet.
New tools from the international community are VssMon an alert utility by Ivan-Assen Ivanov (Sofia, Bulgaria),
SourceSafe2Subversion by Kirit and Tai Saelensminde (FSL Technologies, London, England),
and SQL to SourceSafe Scripter by Serkan Subasi (SBS Software , Istanbul Turkiye).
If you want to suggest a product that i've missed then please email me.
I am particularly interested in products from publishers outside the US, in languages other than English.
'US$ GBP Euros' indicate a commercial license. Don't let this annotation put you off.
Almost every product offers a free trial, and some offer free one user licenses.
'Free' - may imply GNU or other licence restrictions.
'S-W' - indicates ShareWare.
'MLS' - indicates multiple language support.
'SAR' - some assembly required.
If you found this page useful you might want to check out the companion page listing every third party Visual Studio Team System and Team Foundation System product, tool, utility, add-in and resource on the planet.
VssWebHandler is an ASP.NET handler allowing access to any number of SourceSafe databases using any browser. Built with.NET framework 1.0. It may work with .NET framework 1.1 but it has not been tested yet. Visual Source Safe 6.0c.
This very cool tool runs as a Windows service, and generates RSS feeds based on the change logs in VSS. It requires .NET 1.1, and build files are included for Visual Studio .NET 2003.
Publisher: Creekside Technology Group Category: .Net Pricing: US$
SyncVss propagates renames and deletes of files and folders from Visual Studio.Net to Visual SourceSafe.
It supplies the functionality not provided by Microsoft (Microsoft Knowledge Base article 305516; [INFO: SSAFE: Renames and Deletions Not Supported for Source Code Control Through the Visual Studio .NET IDE].
SyncVss uses VS.Net to synchronize the Web Project Fileshare and the VSS database
Synchronization enables building of .Net projects from the Visual SourceSafe database rather than directly from developer local directories or uncontrolled FileShares.
Cut and paster of files and folders is supported and will replicate the changes to VSS.
Drag and Drop of files and folders and replication to VSS is NOT supported.
Creekside sell and support SyncVss on an as-requested basis for Visual Studio 2003 users only.
To contact them use the link on this page.
VSSThinClientSmart is a thin-client for Microsoft® Visual SourceSafe. The application targets the .NET Compact Framework and the .NET Framework to provide a user-friendly GUI to access a Visual SourceSafe database over a network from a Pocket PC or SmartPhone.
Publisher: Bill Wunder Category: .Net Pricing: One full license free
Based upon the DMO object model, this utility generates consistently formatted Microsoft's SQL Server 2000 Data Definition Language (DDL) scripts and archives them into a Microsoft Visual SourceSafe repository.
Difference reports between environments provide fast forward or backward recovery capability especially useful for for forward recovery of stored procedures and triggers in development and rollback recovery for stored procedures and triggers in production.
Tool to remove all SourceSafe bindings from a selected folder, including subfolders. It displays the file names, and won't delete unless the checkbox is checked so you can see if any important files would be deleted. (There is no option to selectively remove files from the list to be deleted).
SourceSafe bindings are plain text files ending in scc, either .scc or .vssscc, but the pattern matches any file with an extension ending in *scc. You can change the pattern match in the application config file (need to include the * for wildcard matches).
Publisher: Roy Dictus Category: .Net Pricing: Free
A handy little utility for developers to clean up their solution directories and files.
It can remove all links in project and solution files to source code control (Visual SourceSafe, SourceGear, Vault etc), clear the Visual Studio Web cache, delete bin and obj directories, delete debug and release direcories, and delete *.user files.
Publisher: Michael Carbenayx Category: .Net Pricing: Free Reviews:
A small tool to remove source control info from VisualStudio.NET 2003 solution and project files.
Use it only if you experience "Unspecified error" messages with the Change Source Control dialog. The recommended way is to use the Unbind button.
Source Control Provider Selector, or SCP Selector for short, is a small application that will allow you to change the default source control provider in VS.Net on your system.
Publisher: Soenke Schau Category: .Net Pricing: Free Reviews: Alin Constantin
Sourcecode Control Switcher offers an interface to choose all installed SCC providers instead of just using the default provider in SCC integration.
It has three purposes:
1. Give a visual clue to which SCC provider is currently active.
2. Provide an interface to change between SCC providers.
3. Start the UI of the current provider.
Publisher: Microsoft Power Toys Category: .Net Administration Pricing: Free Code: SAR
A simple tool that allows importing and exporting list of users from one database to another. It also allows importing a user list from a Windows group.
Publisher: GotDotNet Workspace Category: .Net Builds Pricing: Free Code: SAR
Provides a powerful, easy-to-use, and extensible .NET build automation tool. It's written with a pipeline architecture that operates plug-ins implementing a simple interface, so it's easy to add your own build steps OR use the several that ship with BusyBee.
Right now BusyBee can: * copy, move, delete files and directories * label/get from Visual SourceSafe * build solution files with Visual Studio 2003 * run NUnit tests * run FxCop * email build results to the whole team (or any list of emails) * archive builds to labeled folders.
Hippo.NET is a tool for streamlining the build process of .NET projects in a team environment. It provides continuous integration by monitoring the shared Visual SourceSafe database and starting the build process when changes are detected.
An important design goal is to provide a nice and easy-to-use user interface, to monitor builds and trigger the build process when needed.
Visual Sourcesafe LAN (ssscc.dll) provides basic source control functionality plus an optional LAN booster for improved performance. SourceSafe Internet (RemoteVssScc.dll) supports database access via the internet.
Publisher: Nick Bitounis Category: Addins Pricing: US$
VSSDocuments provides VSS integration with Windows Explorer. With a single click ANY type of document can be added, deleted, checked in to or out from a VSS database.
SourceXplore is a shell extension which allows you to perform basic SourceSafe operations directly from windows explorer.
It is no longer supported but free.
Publisher: Alin Constantin Category: Administration Pricing: Free Reviews:
This is a sample program that tests the connection to the RPC service used by Visual SourceSafe 2005.
The program checks the access to the service by ping-ing it, and queries the status of a database file $/File.txt (possible values returned: 1 - file exists, 0 - does not exist, etc)
Source code is provided.
Publisher: Microsoft Power Toys Category: .Net Administration Pricing: Free Code: SAR
A simple tool that allows importing and exporting list of users from one database to another. It also allows importing a user list from a Windows group.
Prevents SourceSafe from checking files in when there isn't enough disk space left on the drive. Aids documentation for C/C++/IDL/ODL files by automatically adding/updating header information to the files if it is missing.
WorkingFolders allows you to manage your working folder overrides,
either locally for a single user, or project-wide for the entire team.
WorkingFolders lets users see the current state of their SourceSafe working folder mappings.
This includes defaults as well as any explicit overrides they have made.
Users can then reset overrides if they wish.
Publisher: Microsoft Power Toys Category: .Net Administration Pricing: Free Code: SAR
A simple tool that allows importing and exporting list of users from one database to another. It also allows importing a user list from a Windows group.
The tool automatically generates SQL schema scripts for Microsoft SQL Server databases at pre-defined intervals,
and archives them into Microsoft SourceSafe. Interested parties are notified by email of created, altered or dropped schema objects.
Used as a collaboration tool it can keep developers aware of changes and allows for rollbacks to prior versions.
Sourcesafe Spy can monitor and send notifications for any SourceSafe repository that has journaling enabled.
It has three nice features:
* SMTP notification.
* Non intrusive popup.
* Minimizes to systemtray.
Publisher: Ramon Smits Category: Alerts Pricing: Free
VSSMon is a tool which helps you monitor the changes happening to your Visual SourceSafe database .
It checks what's changed for the last N hours and builds an HTML report, complete with names of the users who edited the file and color-coded diffs.
VSSAction™ monitors your Visual SourceSafe™ (VSS) file activities, and sends reports to authorized recipients using email.
Reports can be customized for each recipient on which file, action to watch, and how often a report gets sent.
You can also define your own report format to fit your company policy and style.
This very cool tool runs as a Windows service, and generates RSS feeds based on the change logs in VSS. It requires .NET 1.1. Build files are included for Visual Studio .NET 2003.
FileWatch provides instant email notification based on SourceSafe activity. Emails are customizable by Sourcesafe database, Projects and Files, Users, and activity (check-ins, labels etc).
SSMonitor is a free Windows Scripting utility written to monitor the activity in a Visual SourceSafe journal file.
Various event pattern filters can be defined, and email messages can be sent to notify developers when these events occur.
Use SSMonitor to email summary reports of VSS activity every day, and to broadcast significant events (like file deletions or project build setting changes) to all developers.
SSMonitor is designed to be run in a console window on any machine with access to the SourceSafe journal file. No VSS automation component is used, and no VSS license is required. SSMonitor can be run as an NT service.
Publisher: Microsoft Category: Analyze Pricing: Free Reviews: Korby Parnell
Datawiz is a beta level utility used to remove "orphan projects" and fix file pathing problems in Visual SourceSafe.
Datawiz can run against a live database.
It produces a report of errors in the datawiz log and a batch file to correct the errors fixdata.bat.
As much as 20% of the typical SourceSafe repository may consist of duplicated or inappropriately branched files.
SSAnalyzer helps you reduce your software maintenance costs by as much as 10% by identifying problems you many not even know you have. The problems include:
* Duplicated files (evil twins)
* Inapproriately branch/rollback files
* Significant number of unpurge projects and files
* Orphan projects and files
ClientShutdown gives SourceSafe administrators the ability to shutdown SourceSafe clients without having to leave their desk.
This includes SourceSafe-enabled applications like Visual Studio and Allaire Homesite.
This capability is extremely useful for SourceSafe administrators who need to perform periodic maintenance tasks such as running Analyze.
Note that a SourceVizor Addin must be installed on each client machine where shutdown capability is needed.
Perl End-to-End Analyze Script for Keeping a VSS Database Healthy. The script:
1) Forcibly disconnects all users from a VSS database.
2) Locks the VSS database
3) Runs Analyze.exe
Publisher: Robert Cowham Category: Analyze; Pricing: Free
vss_deleted_files.pl A script to print out a list of VSS files and directories which are marked as deleted.
vss_illegal_filenames.pl Prints out VSS files that are "illegal" as far as Perforce is concerned (e.g. have @, #, *, % or unprintable chars in their name).
vss_linked_files.pl A script to print out a list of linked (shared or branched) files in a VSS repository.
SourceReplicator allows or more development teams to work concurrently on one or more SourceSafe databases and keeps them automatically synchronized.
Subscribers can be notified by email of events such as file checkins, checkouts or deletions. The administrator can create automatic notifications of replication errors.
SourceReplicator has a friendly web based interface allowing users to change their notification preferences, email addresses, and Sourcesafe passwords.
Backup your visual sourcesafe (VSS) source code tree easy and reliable with this simple but effective batch script. Just schedule the script, edit the params to your needs and let it run. The output is written in seperate directories and best of all, it's easy to backup these files to either another machine or to tape using your own backup-software. No unreadable, strange VSS database to backup anymore. Just backup the real files!
Publisher: ViewTier Systems Category: Builds Pricing: US$
ViewTier's flagship product is Parabuild 2.0, an automated build management server. The key focus is on simple installation and maintenance, automated builds to support continuous integration environments, and fast feedback on changes that break a build.
ViewTier also offer Devenv, a free command line utility to set Windows command shell, Unix and Cygwin sh or bash shell environments uniformly across software team members and development platforms.
Management layer on top of existing build scripts, batch files, etc. Supports concurrent (multi-threaded) processing and server pooling for distributed builds. Command line interface to SourceSafe and other vc systems. Datasheet here.
An Open Source daily build and continuous integration tool. Performs automated builds by monitoring changes in the Sourcesafe repository, and can also manage history builds. Supports many other version control systems.
VssReporter is a build engineer's tool for querying SourceSafe to find out what source files have been changed after, before or between certain dates.
Dates can be an explicit eg '02/08/2002' or implicit eg a label. It will allow you to query for modifications made by anyone, only yourself, or a named coder.
NAnt is a free .NET build tool. In theory it is kind of like make without make's wrinkles. In practice it's a lot like Ant.
The NAnt Task reference lists the tasks NAnt can perform against a SourceSafe database:
vssaddUsed to add files to a Visual SourceSafe database. vsscheckin Used to checkin files into Visual Source Safe. vsscheckoutTask used to checkout files from Visual Source Safe. vssdelete Used to delete or Destroy files or projects in Visual Source Safe. vssdiff Used to generate differences in a vss database. vssget Used to retrieve an item or project from a Visual Source Safe database. vsshistory Generates an XML file showing all changes made to a Visual Source Safe database vsslabel Used to apply a label to a Visual Source Safe item. vssundocheckout Task is used to undo a checkout from SourceSafe.
Publisher: GotDotNet Workspace Category: .Net Builds Pricing: Free Code: SAR
Provides a powerful, easy-to-use, and extensible .NET build automation tool. It's written with a pipeline architecture that operates plug-ins implementing a simple interface, so it's easy to add your own build steps OR use the several that ship with BusyBee.
Right now BusyBee can: * copy, move, delete files and directories * label/get from Visual SourceSafe * build solution files with Visual Studio 2003 * run NUnit tests * run FxCop * email build results to the whole team (or any list of emails) * archive builds to labeled folders.
Publisher: x Category: Builds .Net Pricing: Free/td>
Hippo.NET is a tool for streamlining the build process of .NET projects in a team environment. It provides continuous integration by monitoring the shared Visual SourceSafe database and starting the build process when changes are detected.
An important design goal is to provide a nice and easy-to-use user interface, to monitor builds and trigger the build process when needed.
Publisher: Kirit & Tai Saelensminde Category: Conversion Pricing: Free
The Sourcesafe2subversion tool will take a complete SourceSafe repository and replay the events into a Subversion repository.
Unlike the earlier tools this one attempts to preserve knowledge about the common ancestry of files by replaying SourceSafe share and branch instructions whenever possible.
There is a complete description at this link<.a>
This SCC API plug-in provides access from practically all Microsoft SCC enabled software to general CVS repositories. The Microsoft SCC API is supported by: MS VC 5.0-7.0, MS VB 5.0-7.0, MS .NET, MS FrontPage, MS DEV and other Microsoft development tools. With the support of 3rd party tools this plug-in can be used by Borland IDE's.
The tool automatically generates SQL schema scripts for Microsoft SQL Server databases at pre-defined intervals,
and archives them into Microsoft SourceSafe. Interested parties are notified by email of created, altered or dropped schema objects.
Used as a collaboration tool it can keep developers aware of changes and allows for rollbacks to prior versions.
Publisher: Sriram Chitturi Category: Database Pricing: Free Codes: SAR
Script and store SQL Server Objects in SourceSafe using SQL DMO and Visual SourceSafe automation. Customizable code that you can use to track changes to tables, procedures etc in your SQL Server databases.
Script Runner is an application that executes files against a database. The capabilities of the application include:
Continuous directory monitoring for files to execute.
Manual execution of a file or directory of files.
Manual execution of a file or a project from a SourceSafe database.
File execution report. Measuring file execution duration.
Ability to execute multiple files at a time.
Ability to execute files against multiple servers and/or databases at once.
Be aware that the publisher's site is no longer on-line and the product is apparently no longer supported.
Scriptrunner can still be downloaded from several software sites including Download.com.
Publisher: Markus Egger Category: FoxPro Pricing: Free
SourceSafe Boost is an Visual FoxPro utility that checks for all files that are handled by SourceSafe, in a given directory and all the subdirectories. If such a file is found (that is checked out too), the text file is updated. The advantage of SourceSafe Boost is that this process is extremly quick. Even if there are a number of files checked out, it usually only takes a couple of seconds to update.
A SourceSafe remote/internet access tool. It enables you to use Visual SourceSafe easily over the Internet. With SourceAnyWhere, you can perform most SourceSafe operations from any remote location using standard TCP/IP access.
This article by Amy Gu, Dynamsoft Corporation, discusses the issues that arise when using SourceSafe remotely over the internet.
Web-based tool for tracking and managing issues such as bugs, defects, support calls, and weekly timesheets. Issues can be linked to corresponding source objects in Visual SourceSafe databases, and version control operations executed. Because Census is Web-based it provides cross-platform, Internet access to Visual SourceSafe databases.
Publisher: Arthur Nesterovsky Category: Remote Access Pricing: Free
Freeware project that implements remote access to version control systems (including SourceSafe) via web service. See also their main page and this link.
With SourceXT, dispersed project teams can access your SourceSafe files from anywhere in the world, as long as you have an Internet connection.
SourceXT is based on Microsoft .NET technology. It has a Server and a Client portion.
The Server controls access to SourceSafe databases by living on the same LAN as the VSS computers. To the Internet world, the Server functions as a Web Service that provides and receives data to and from its Clients.
The Client portion is a user friendly Windows application that works like a file explorer.
SourceOffSite is specifically designed for companies with cross-site or cross-platform development teams that need fast and secure read/write access to a centralized SourceSafe database via TCP/IP connection. Version 4.2 features.
* IDE integration (Visual Studio 2005, VS.NET 2003, Visual Basic 6, Visual C++, Visual J++).
* GUI and command-line clients.
* Optional 128-bit data encryption and data compression.
* Supports all major SourceSafe 6.0 and 7.0 (VSS 2005) operations.
* Integration with Dragnet, a web-based bug-tracking system.
* Client: Windows 95/98/NT/2000/2003/XP, Mac OS X, Solaris 5.1 (2.5.1) or later and Linux 2.4 and later.
* Server: Windows 2000/2003/XP.
Publisher: Source Remoting Category: Remote Access Pricing: US$ (Free for one user)
VSS Remoting is a client/server based remote SourceSafe database accessing software. Using VSS Remoting, you can access your SourceSafe databases through any internet connections in a fast and secure way.
Plugins provide seamless integration with Visual Studio, Eclipse, Dreamweaver and Flash IDE.
Since SourceSafe is designed around Windows network file sharing, rather than a client/server architecture, remote access can be painfully slow on low bandwidth connections and the possibility for database corruption is high.
VssConnect was designed to overcome these shortcomings, providing a low cost solution to remote SourceSafe access.
VssConnect consists of an easy to install and manage server component and remote clients which communicate with the server using a standard TCP protocol.
Multiple checkouts are supported.
SourceSafe Reporter is a flexible reporting tool for extracting the wide range of information currently locked in your Microsoft Visual SourceSafe™ databases.
Quickly and effectively report on projects, files, versions, permissions, checkouts and users.
- List all the projects and files in a SourceSafe database.
- List of files with detailed version information, filtered by date range or by label.
- Report on the Project Permissions that users have in a SourceSafe Database.
- Report on every file that is currently checked out of a SourceSafe database.
- Report on all user login accounts for a SourceSafe Database.
SourceSafe Reporter requires the Microsoft Visual SourceSafe client tools to be installed before it can be run.
CodeMiner VSS Manager is a comprehensive repository monitoring and reporting tool for managing change sets in VSS (Visual Source Safe). This web-based software helps Product Manager monitor changes and project development.
With VSS Manager, you can get answer for critical questions about your repository, such as:
* Is my project converging?
* How has my project progressed over time?
* What critical files had been added in the last few hours?
Publisher: Alexander Zammit Category: Report Pricing: Free
Extracts all the file and project information from MS Visual SourceSafe to an SQL server or Access database. Uses include usage management, extraction of source history for record keeping..
SourceReports provides visibility into the growth and activity of your project.
SourceSafe activity is stored in a separate DBMS. Report generation is fast and does not bog down SourceSafe for other users.
Over 30 different report types include project growth, project activity, and developer activity.
Reports can be exported in XML, comma delimited format, or to the database of your choice. Selection is from a project tree view. New reports include productivity and users lists.
Publisher: Jonathan Hodgson Category: RSS Pricing: Free
Jonathan Hodgson discusses code that 'allows me to see what, when and who has changed files recently'.
It runs every 30 minutes and generates an XML file saved on a webserver with RSS items for new checkins on a specified VSS branch.
It works using the Visual SourceSafe COM object via get_VSSItem and get_Versions recusively.
The code is not posted with the article.
This very cool tool runs as a Windows service, and generates RSS feeds based on the change logs in VSS. It requires .NET 1.1, and build files are included for Visual Studio .NET 2003.
Vault is designed to be a painless replacement for SourceSafe.
Repository data is stored in a SQL Server 2000 database.
The SourceSafe import tool wizard captures every version of every file, including change comments. Even shares and pins are properly maintained.
Remote client support includes compression and binary deltas to minimize network traffic.
An IDE integration client allows Vault to be used from within Microsoft Visual Studio.
The initial development and design of NGSource was very much shaped by reseaech group feedback on the limitations of and issues withSourceSafe.
Views effectively abstract the otherwise complex concepts of Branching, Sharing, Pinning and Shadowing.
NGSource 3 is SQLServer/MSDE based.
SourceAnywhere Standalone is a MS SQL Server based source control tool designed to be a better replacement for Microsoft Visual SourceSafe.
It provides a familiar SourceSafe GUI with painless data migration from SourceSafe.
Implemented as a server-client, it provides fast remote access for geographically distributed teams.
Publisher: Larry C. Whipple Category: Training Pricing: US$ Reviews:
Set of 3 Visual SourceSafe 6 training videos from an industry expert. How to install and manage your software with basic and advanced administrative tools, command line expansion, INI files, and much more.
Publisher: Kevin Gao Category: Tutorials Pricing: Free
Kevin's site focuses on SourceSafe tutorials. A useful resource whether you are new to Sourcesafe and looking to get a handle on the basics, or just looking for help with a specific problem.
Publisher: Yuri Mironoff Category: Unix Pricing: OS
Full access (Import, Get, CheckOut CheckIn, History etc) to Windows basewd VSS Repositories from the Unix/Linux/OS X command line. Also integrates into the CodeForge IDE.
Publisher: CM Services Limited Category: Workflow Pricing: US$
Interfaces SourceSafe 2005 with publisher's CMW 2006 workgroup, collaboration and decision support system. Allows users to label changes automatically using tasks that are exported out of CMW.
Issue and Task workflow management of change requests, bugs, defects, problem reports, requirements, and other issues.
Tight integration within the Visual Studio environment and integration to Visual SourceSafe
Publisher: Steve Appling Category: XML Pricing: Free
SS2XML is a simple set of utilities to extract all the meta-information (not the file contents) from a Visual SourceSafe database and store it in an XML format. It's Open Source and licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0.