Qasim Rasheed

I work with Source Safe as a source control repository in my current job where I also acted as a Configuration Manager for Capability Maturity Model (CMM) compliance. One of my job description is to manage sourcesafe database. Recently I was getting tired of manually backing up the source safe database by going into the source safe administration and going through manual back up procedure. So I decided to automate the procedure. What I end up doing is creating a batch file and creating a schedule task on my windows machine so that it wouldn't require any manual intervention and could run on weekends. My goals for this process were to 1. Automate the process so it occurs once a week. 2. Generate backup files that are identified by date (ie. '08-20-2000 Project Backup.ssa'). Step 1: Create a batch file which looks like this @ECHO OFF rem ****************************************** rem This file is used to run backup on a specified Source Safe database or individual project. rem You can use windows scheduler service to schedule this task run periodically preferablly rem once a week. I have set up 'VSS' folder on my local drive with 'backup' as a subfolder. This rem batch file will create a new file within the 'backup' named as current date. rem ********************************************** @TITLE Backing up source safe databases FOR /F "tokens=2-4 delims=/ " %%i IN ('date /t') DO SET DATE=%%i-%%j-%%k cd\ cd program files\microsoft visual studio\vss\win32 ssarc -yAdmin,sourcesafeadminpassword -d- -i-y -sC:\source_safe repository c:\VSS\backups\%DATE% mybackup.ssa $/ @ECHO Finished backups * replace sourcesafeadminpassword with your password * replace "-sC:\source_safe repository" with the location of your source safe repository. * replace "c:\VSS\backups" with your choice of location for backup. * $/ represents the whole source safe tree. You can include a project name if you want to back only a particular project. Step 2: Automate the batch file with the window scheduler service. After following the above two steps you should be good to go and your backups will be saved in the location that you have specified in the batch file. I will write more about the batch file and explaining various parameters later.