TFS 2012 Issue: Get Workspace already exists connecting with VS 2008 or VS 2010

Issue

When you have VS 2008 or VS 2010 installed as well as VS 2012 and you are connecting to TFS 2012 you my get an error the first time that you connect:

Figure: The Workspace already exists on computer

This results in this error ever time you start VS 2010 or VS 2008.

Applies to

• Visual Studio 2008 connecting to Team Foundation Server 2012
• Visual Studio 2010 connecting to Team Foundation Server 2012

Finding

If Visual Studio 2012 is the first thing that you open to create a new workspace against a new collection a default workspace of “computername;username” will be created as a “Local” workspace.

When you subsequently open VS 2008 or VS 2010, which do not support Local Workspaces, you get this error when it tries to create a workspace. Visual Studio does not detect that this workspace already exists as when it queries the server the “agent” filtering does not return local workspaces.

Workaround

Manually create a “Server” workspace for use in VS 2010 and VS 2008.

Figure: Create a new Workspace with a new Name

1. Select “File | Source Control | Workspaces… | Add…”
2. Fill out a new name and then select “OK”
3. Select your new Workspace from the drop down

You can now connect to Source Control..