How To Manually Promote a Label in Visual SourceSafe (246914)

SUMMARY

Visual SourceSafe 6.0 automatically promotes a file into a preexisting project label when the user creates a file label with the same name as the label applied to its parent project. Automatic label promotions only work when both Visual SourceSafe 6.0 is installed and the database has the updated database format. Earlier versions of Visual SourceSafe do not allow you to promote a file by applying a file label. Instead, you need to reapply the project label. For additional information, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

246910 INFO: How Do Label Promotions Work in SourceSafe 6.0

MORE INFORMATION

The following example leads you through the process of labeling a project, editing a file in that project, then promoting the edited file into the existing label. This example assumes that a project named MyProject exists in Visual SourceSafe, and that the project contains a file named MyFile, whose current version in Visual SourceSafe is version 3.

Step 1: Label the Project

Select the project called MyProject.
Select the Label option from the File menu.
Type in a label name for the project, like Version1.

Step 2: Modify the File

Select the file MyFile.
Check the file out, edit it, then check it back in.

At this point, the current version of MyFile is version 4. If you were to go into the history of MyProject, select the label Version1, and retrieve the project, you would get version 3 of MyFile. To associate version 4 of MyFile with the Version1 label, you need to do the following:

Step 3: Promoting the Edited File into the Preexisting Label

Select the project MyProject.
Choose the Label option from the File menu.
In the Label dialog box type Version1. You receive a dialog box that states:
The label Version1 is already used. Remove the old Label?
Click Yes.

This recycles the label name Version1, and you are now be able to retrieve the project using the Version1 label and have Visual SourceSafe retrieve version 4 of MyFile rather than version 3.

For additional information on changing a label in Visual SourceSafe, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

126786 How To Remove or Change a Label

For additional information on using labels in Visual SourceSafe, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

139298 How To Include Specific File Revisions in a Project Label

130176 Project versus File Labeling in SourceSafe

162114 How To How To Issue a Recursive GET Based on a Project Label