Connect older Visual Studio to TFS 2010 (VS 2005 & VS 2008)

It is certainly possible to connect older Visual Studio clients to TFS 2010. Most of the functionality just works. In order to make it work you need a compatibility update. The updates can be found here:

VS2008

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=cf13ea45-d17b-4edc-8e6c-6c5b208ec54d&displaylang=en

VS2005

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=22215e4c-af6f-4e2f-96df-20e94d762689&displaylang=en

Beware !:

SP1 (both VS2008 and VS2005) is needed for this update. Make sure SP1 is installed before you install the compatibility update. All components in Visual Studio need to be updated. Sometimes it happens that you have SP 1 installed (according to the about) but Team Explorer is installed after that. The compatibility update will fail if this is the case.

To make sure, reinstall SP1.

VS2008

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=FBEE1648-7106-44A7-9649-6D9F6D58056E

VS2005

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=BB4A75AB-E2D4-4C96-B39D-37BAF6B5B1DC

If you receive any of these errors:

• When clicking the installation it says that no products are found to update with this installation.
• After installing and registering a new server it says it cannot connect.

This means that SP1 is not correctly installed. Reinstall SP1

Register new server in VS 2005/2008

• Go to Team Explorer
• Click + icon

• Click Servers
• Click Add
• On Team Foundation Server name,  type [http://<tfs.server.url>:8080/tfs/DefaultCollection]. Type this including http and 8080 !
• Click OK
• Click Close
• Pick the right server

Now you are able to connect !