Question

Using the Source Control Explorer for TFS in Visual Studio, is there a way to detect local changes to files (or even new files in the directory hierarchy) that weren’t first checked out?

We have a highly disconnected setup at my current client whereby accessing TFS means being on a specific VPN, which breaks connections to other things (such as internal database servers and any web access). So any time a file needs to be modified we need to connect, check out, disconnect, which leads to what I feel is a derailing mental context switch for the developer (especially when working with a lot of files and not knowing ahead of time which ones are going to need to be modified).

We can just work locally and select “Overwrite” any time Visual Studio asks us what we want to do with various non-checked-out files. But then is there a way to detect what files have been changed (or at least made writable) when we want to sync back with the server?

Or maybe I’m going about this all wrong? Backing up a step, what’s the ideal way to work on a solution that’s bound to but disconnected from TFS source control?

Answer 1

Since David’s suggested this might work in his comment, here are the instructions for disabling the remote gateway on the VPN connection. (admittedly this makes it a bit more of a “SuperUser” answer, even if the question was StackOverflow…)

• Open the “Network and Sharing Centre”
• Click “Change adapter settings” (on the left)
• Right-click your VPN connection & select “Properties”
• On the “Networking” tab, select the IP4 protocol (“Internet Protocol Version 4”) and click Properties
• Click “Advanced”
• On the “IP settings” tab, untick “Use default gateway on remote network”
• Click “OK” on everything

I think you have to reconnect the VPN for this to take effect, but basically what this does is stops routing all network traffic through your VPN, and only routes through the stuff that it can’t find on the regaular connection. Hopefully that’ll mean you can see both TFS and SQL at once!

Good luck 😉