Web Projects and Team Foundation version control

In Visual Studio 2005, web projects no longer have explicit project files.  The only Visual Studio housekeeping artifact is the solution file.  This raises a few questions about how to deal with web projects and version control.

Once the web project files have been checked in, your team members can access it from the File menu as shown below.

Frame392

This menu option produces the Open Web Site dialog box that has options for opening web sites from:

  • The local file system
  • The local IIS
  • A FTP Site
  • A Remote Site
  • From Source Control

If your team members have already synchronized their workspaces, they can simply choose the local file system.  Otherwise, they can choose the Source Control option and choose a local working folder.  In either case, they will have the option of running the web project through IIS or the desktop web server.

The File ->  Open -> Web Site… option is sometimes not immediately intuitive, so I thought I would blog about it.  Hope this helps!

Eric.