Yeah, I'm guilty. I tried VSS 2005. To be absolutely honestly I have stayed away from VSS for so many years because I had no interest in losing my projects to corruption. This fear led me to be a Sourcegear Vault user, which by the way is a very nice product. Never the less I figure VSS 2005 must be better than it's previous release, VSS 6, so I decided to give it a shot on a small project. It went pretty well until I stumbled into the Internet Plug-in setup with SSL.
VSS 2005, which it seems to look quite a bit like VSS 6 has some new functionality, most notably the Internet Plug-in. This enables you to access VSS over HTTP protocol via web services. Now, I'm used to this, it's how Vault works, but the configuration was less than forgiving.
To start it off you need to create a new VSS database. This is simple enough since the VSS Admin tool gives you a nice wizard to help you out. This connects you to the database and displays the users in the main admin interface pane. Seems simple enough.
Next I click on Server Settings and enabled the Internet Plug-in without SSL. Bam, the VSS Admin tool says I need to connect to my database via its UNC path. Ok, so that tells me I have to share it. I open up Explorer and share the folder. Mind you I AM reading the instructions as I'm doing this even though it may appear as though I'm not. I share the folder and switch back to the VSS Admin interface, click the menu and choose to Open a new VSS database. Bam, can't, it's already open. Ok, so I need to close it. Well, this isn't that easy. The database that's open has a default set to automatically open on startup that you can't deselect. You need to add the database to the list, with a different name since it already exists in the list, but this time by UNC path. Move the default open selection to the new UNC path listing and close and re-open the admin tool. *sigh*
Ok, now I'm connected to the database by UNC path so I go back into Server Settings and enable the Internet Plug-in without SSL. After a silly amount of time waiting on it to complete the change it clears and the attempt to open the VSS database via the Internet Plug-in from Visual Studio works.
So... being the curious sort I decided to enable SSL on the Internet Plug-in. Wow was that an evolution. Right off I can tell you that enabling SSL makes VSS a very touchy beast. Unless the SSL cert is just perfect it will fail and the admin tool will just report that it couldn't be enabled. No other errors or detailed information is provided, just that it failed. That's when Google and the Microsoft Newsgroups came in. Alin Constantin, an MS guy that I'm guessing works in the VSS group, posted a nice write-up on his site with the steps required to get this to work. He also outlines what criteria have to be met in order for SSL to be enabled. Something neither the help nor the KB does in any way.
You can find Alin's document here Installing and configuring Microsoft Visual SourceSafe for Internet (Remote) access
Now, thanks to Alin, it works with SSL enabled. There was a little pain involved but no where near what I've gone through with other apps. If you are installing VSS 2005 I recommend you read Alin's document above before you attempt to enable the Internet Plug-in.