Using TFS without Visual Studio

Question

Is there some setting in the workspace setup that allows you to edit the files, and have TFS determine what has changed?

I'm working with Matlab code that we would like to have checked in, but since we don't use Visual Studio for that it makes working complicated. (checkout each file we want to edit).

Maybe like Subversion, but we don't have the choice to use another source control system.

Answer 1

Team Foundation Server 2012 introduced the concept of local workspaces. This allows you to work with your files without explicitly having to checkout files before edit.

If you install the Team Foundation Server Power Tools you get integration into Windows Explorer for commands like Get Latest and Checkin.

Answer 2

The PowerTools for TFS have explorer integration (similar to TortoiseSVN) but I never found them to work very well, when you see them flickering away and using up lots of CPU you lose confidence.

You can use the TFS Team Explorer tool, which is basically a cut-down Visual Studio. Its not nice when you're used to better tools, but this is what happens when you have a tool that is so very tightly integrated to VS.