Use Team Foundation Server (TFS) as your Source Control in SSMS

If you want to start using Team Foundation Server as your source control in SSMS it’s fairly easy to set up. Microsoft have made available to download the MSSCCI providers which supply support for source control to a list of products which don’t natively support TFS.

This post assumes you already have a TFS server set up and running. In my case, I already have Visual Studio 2005/2008 and can connect up to my 2008 server already using the built in support for TFS. But you don’t need to have VS installed to use SSMS with TFS.

First of all, you’ll need to install the TFS provider. There are a few different versions of the TFS provider. In my case, I’m connecting to TFS server 2008, so I can use any version of the TFS provider which is 2008 or above. For the 2010 version there is a 64-bit or 32-bit build . I’m running Windows Server 2008 R2 (64-bit) as my OS and in control panel I have SQL Server 2008 R2 (64-bit) installed. However, my version of SSMS is 32-bit. You can check easily by opening SSMS and opening task manager. The *32 at the end of the ssms.exe entry shows it is 32-bit.

Task Manager showing SSMS 32-bit

So in this case I chose to install the TFS 2010 (32-bit version) which works fine for me, but for ease below are the links to the Team Foundation Server MSSCCI providers:

• Team Foundation Server MSSCCI Provider 2005
• Team Foundation Server MSSCCI Provider 2008
• Team Foundation Server MSSCCI Provider 2010 (for 32-bit applications)
• Team Foundation Server MSSCCI Provider 2010 (for 64-bit applications)

To be on the safe side, close SSMS before running the installation.

Once installed, go into SSMS. Then in the Tools menu right down at the bottom you have options. In the options window in the tree navigation you’ll have options for Source Control (as below).

If the installation went OK and you have installed the correct version, you should have “Team Foundation Server MSSCCI Provider” available. Select this provider. There are some additional settings which can be tweaked, but are more preferences than settings to get source control working. (Click OK to save your settings changes).

To connect up to TFS, look in the File menu, and go to Source Control and select Open From Source Control:

Source control menu in SSMS

You’ll be prompted to select a server:

Select a TFS server to connect to

As this is the first time we’ve opened it, there are no servers to pick from. Click Servers… and click Add… to enter the details of the TFS server you wish to connect to. You may be prompted to enter credentials here. Click Close and Cancel.

Now you can create new projects (or open existing ones) to/from TFS.

To create a new project. Select File…New…Project in the usual way, but ensure that the tick-box Add to Source Control is ticked:

SSMS New Project add to Source Control

Hope that provides you with enough information to start adding your SSMS solutions into TFS. Now I can create a library of all our job scripts for a particular server and add the solution into TFS all via SSMS without needing to use VS! Please feel free to add comments of your own implementation experiences and how TFS is going to benefit you via SSMS!