Strange problem with VSS: VSS doesn't work after 5 p.m.

Question

I have a very strange problem with Visual Source Safe. I use VSS as a add-on with VS 2008 in a corporate intranet with 5 other colleagues. My VS stops working after 5 p.m. most of days with complaining can not connect Source Safe. I'm running VS 2008 and VSS 2005 on Vista and no other one in corporate have such a problem.

What do you think about its cause? Is there any log for VSS?

Answer 1

A couple of questions

1. Has it ever worked past 5pm? If it has is there an event you can correlate to when it stopped working?
2. Can you access VSS through VSS Explorer when you can't access it through VS.NET
3. Is the VSS database on a remote server or shared drive? If so can you access that drive after 5pm? VSS is just a bunch of files on the disk. Can you see those files outside of VSS or VS.NET?
4. Any chance someone is doing a backup or something similar to the VSS machine that is bringing the box down? Can you ping the VSS server after 5pm?

Answer 2

You probably have logon restrictions on your domain account.

VSS is a file based source control system and it works via access to a net work share. Account logon restrictions would prevent you from gaining access to the share at certain times.

To test this theory try this:

1. Get the share that VSS lives in. It should be in the form \\SERVER\SHARE.
2. Open a command prompt
3. Type NET USE this will show you all your connections
4. If connected to the share type NET USE Z: /delete (with Z: being the assigned drive letter for that share)
5. Type NET USE * \\SERVER\SHARE

If this theory is correct, before 5 your will get command completed sucessfully, but after 5 you will get access denied