How to have TFS 2010 detect changes done to files outside of Visual Studio?

Question

I\'m using Team Foundation Server 2010 with Visual Studio 2010.

Whenever I modify a file outside of Visual Studio, TFS doesn\'t seem to detect the change done to the

Answer 1

I found that in Visual Studio 2015, with the project open, Visual Studio discovered for itself that files had been modified externally, and automatically checked them out without me having to do anything. Checking in the project in the normal way saved the external modifications.

Answer 2

Visual Sourcesafe works like this too and the way I get VSS or TFS to notice the change is by checking the file out once inside Visual Studio.

Answer 3

Try this. It's some sort of workaround, but it works:

1. make changes outside of Visual Studio
2. go to Visual Studio and open Source Control Explorer
3. right click on the folder > "Check Out for Edit" > "Check Out"
4. right click on the same folder > "Undo Pending Changes..." > "Undo changes" > "No to All"

That's it. The changes are visible now.

Answer 4

In my case, the following worked (at least the one time I tried it):

1. Go to the Pending Changes panel
2. Select View Options under either Included or Excluded changes.
3. Switch between Show All and Show Solution Changes
4. Switch back if desired

Changing the View Option appears to force a refresh of modified files.

Answer 5

Open Source Control and go to your TFS folder. Right-click on the folder and choose 'Compare'.

Notice that your edited files show up marked in red.

I find this is better than tfpt online which also gets you files that are not readonly and not edited.