What's the use of binding in TFS

Question

I got the latest version of a Visual Studio solution on TFS. But when I try to open the solution in Visual Studio I get the following message:

Source Control

The solution you have opened is under source control but not currently configured for integrated source control in Visual Studio. Would you like to bind this solution to source control now?

Asking my colleague, I found out that he's been checking in the changes through Visual Studio without any problem.

Here's my question: Considering the fact that I can still check in my changes via IDE, what is the use of binding a Visual Studio solution or project to TFS (or more generally source control )? Except that "lock"/"red tick" icon appearing beside them in Solution Explorer.

Answer 1

Adding Solutions and Projects to Source Control : When you add a solution to source control, the solution becomes part of a dynamic versioning archive created and maintained by the source control provider. Each time someone checks in a new version of the solution, that version becomes part of the archive and is available to other source control users.

According to the warning message, It seems that you are opening from source control a solution that was incorrectly added to source control (it's missing some bindings strings that should have been in the sln or project files). You should click the button yes and Bind the projects correctly to their server location, then OK the dialog. The server file will be checked out and modified locally. You should checkin the changes after that.