Visual Studio Team System User Education

Migrating from Visual SourceSafe to Team Foundation Source Control

This describes how to migrate from Visual SourceSafe to Team Foundation using the VSSConverter tool, VSSConverter.exe. In that walkthrough you will find detailed information about how to prepare a SourceSafe database and user list for migration to Team Foundation and gain a better understanding of how the migration process works.

In this walkthrough, you will accomplish the following tasks:

• Modify the settings file to specify which folders to migrate.
• Run the converter to migrate the source from Visual SourceSafe to Team Foundation and generate a migration report.

Prerequisites

Before you try to complete this walkthrough:

• Perform all steps as outlined in Walkthrough: Preparing to Migrate from Visual SourceSafe to Team Foundatione6d65e5b-e66d-4dd1-8308-20e983585211.
• Identify empty folders in Team Foundation source control where you want to migrate your Visual SourceSafe folders. If the destination folder does not exist, the converter will create it for you. The only exception is if the destination folder is a team project. The destination folder should be either a valid team project or a subfolder of a valid team project.

Additionally, you need:

• A Team Foundation Server name.
• You must be a member of the Team Foundation Administrators group.
• Install SQL Server Express on the computer where you plan to run the converter.

By default, SQL Express is installed when you install Visual Studio 2005 Team System.

You must have sufficient permissions to connect to a SQLExpress database to use the converter tool.

• Visual SourceSafe 2005 on computer where you run VSSConverter.

Migrating SourceSafe Project Folders

Before you continue with the actual conversion, customize your settings file to include the destination folders for the SourceSafe projects that you specified when preparing for conversion. You must complete all of the steps as outlined in Walkthrough: Preparing to Migrate from Visual SourceSafe to Team Foundatione6d65e5b-e66d-4dd1-8308-20e983585211 to complete this task.

To modify the settings file:

1. Click Start, click Programs, point to Microsoft Visual Studio 2005, point to Visual Studio Tools, and then click Visual Studio 2005 Command Prompt.
2. At the command prompt, type cd %DriveLetter%\VSS2TeamFoundation. Create this folder if one does not exist.

Note   Ensure that the system drive has sufficient space to hold the largest file size under migration.

3. Copy the settings file that you created for the analysis and save it under a new name, for example, migration_settings.xml.
4. Type migration_settings.xml in Notepad.
5. Change the settings file as follows:

• In the <ProjectMap> section, for each VSS folder that you are migrating, add the destination folders in Team Foundation source control. Use the following format, adding the Destination section as shown in the following example.

<Project Source="$/FolderA" Destination="$/Team_Project"></Project>

To migrate everything in your VSS database, insert the following XML instead.

<Project Source="$/" Destination="$/Team_Project/"></Project>

• Under the <Settings> section, add a <TeamFoundationServer> section, and specify the name, port, and protocol for the Team Foundation Server to which you are migrating. Use the following format.

<TeamFoundationServer name="TFS_server_name" port="port_number" protocol="http"></TeamFoundationServer>

For example,

<TeamFoundationServer name="AdventureWorks" port="8080" protocol="http"></TeamFoundationServer>

Note   If you have a large Visual SourceSafe database, your migration may fail because of the 4-GB limit of SQLExpress. To resolve this, you can either migrate a partial history as described in How to: Migrate a Partial History Using Archives in Visual SourceSafe, or set the converter to use SQLServer instead by adding the following line: <SQL Server="SQL_Server_name"></SQL>

6. Save your changes and close Notepad.

To create a new settings file:

1. Click Start, click Programs, point to Microsoft Visual Studio 2005, point to Visual Studio Tools, and then click Visual Studio 2005 Command Prompt.
2. At the command prompt, type cd %DriveLetter%\VSS2TeamFoundation.
3. Copy the settings file that you created for the analysis and save it under a new name.
4. Type notepad migration_settings.xml, and then press ENTER. Click Yes to create a new file.
5. Copy the following XML into settings.xml.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<SourceControlConverter>
      <ConverterSpecificSetting>
            <Source name="VSS">
                  <VSSDatabase name="c:\VSSDatabase"></VSSDatabase>
                  <UserMap name="c:\Migrate\Usermap.xml"></UserMap>
            </Source>
            <ProjectMap>
                  <Project Source="$/FolderA" Destination="$/TeamProjectA"></Project>
                  <Project Source="$/FolderB" Destination ="$/TeamProjectB/ProjectB"></Project>
            </ProjectMap>
      </ConverterSpecificSetting>
      <Settings>
            <TeamFoundationServer name="server_name" port="port_number" protocol="protocol"></TeamFoundationServer>
      </Settings>
</SourceControlConverter>

6. Change the migration settings file as follows.

In the <ProjectMap> section, for each VSS folder that you are migrating, replace FolderA with the source VSS folders and replace TeamProjectA with the destination folders in Team Foundation source control. Include a <Project> entry for all the folders that you want to migrate.

To migrate everything in your VSS database, insert the following XML instead.

<Project Source="$/" Destination="$/Team_Project/"></Project>

Note   The converter uses SQL Express during migration. If your migration fails because of the 4-GB limit in SQL Express, you can set the converter to use SQL Server instead by adding the following line to the <Source name="VSS"> section: <SQL Server="SQL_Server_name"></SQL>

7. Save your changes and close Notepad.

To run the converter

1. Copy your Visual SourceSafe database to a local folder on the computer on which you want to run analysis and migration. Although you can migrate a Visual SourceSafe database in a shared folder on a remote computer, the migration takes much longer to finish.
2. Click Start, click All Programs, then select Microsoft Visual Studio, Visual Studio Tools, and then Visual Studio Command Prompt.
3. At the command prompt, type the following:
   VSSConverter Migrate migration_settings.xml

Tip   Use the /? switch to view the available command-line options.

4. Type Y to confirm the migration.
   The converter tool displays the migration status. When the conversion process is finished, the tool saves a migration report in the current directory. You can use Internet Explorer to view the file for more information.
5. When you are prompted, provide the password for the Visual SourceSafe admin user.