INFO: How the Fast Get Operation Works in Visual SourceSafe 6.0 (221576)

SUMMARY

One of the major enhancements made to Visual SourceSafe version 6.0 is its ability to retrieve files from its database more quickly than previous version of Visual SourceSafe could. This enhancement is called a Fast Get.

This article describes the changes made to the Visual SourceSafe 6.0 database architecture that allows it to accomplish the Fast Get operation.

MORE INFORMATION

Before users can take advantage of the Fast Get enhancement they need to be using the version 6.0 database format.

The updated version 6.0 database format has the following elements, which allow it to perform faster Get operations:

Crcs.dat: This item can be found in the DATA directory. It contains CRC information for items in the database.
Vssver.scc: These files can be found on the client computer. They contain the names, CRCs, version numbers, and timestamps of the files on the local computer.

When a Get, Check Out, or other operation is performed that requires Visual SourceSafe to put a copy of a file into the working folder of the client computer, a Vssver.scc file is created and placed in the working folder as well (or updated if it already exists).

When Visual SourceSafe performs one of the actions listed above, it compares the time stamp of the local file against the time stamp for the file in the Vssver.scc file. If they match, then it compares the CRC in the Vssver.scc file against the CRC in the Crcs.dat file.

Previous versions of SourceSafe did not have the benefit of the Crcs.dat and Vssver.scc files.