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>>>Paul, thank you very much for the detailed and helpful message.
>>>One question I would like to ask you to clarify. When you say "shared source controls system" you mean that the entire source is in the cloud and only available via Internet connection? Also, if you do implement the shared source control system, can you still have the entire project/solution on your local drive? and use it without Internet (e.g. on a plane?)
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>>The source code ends up being in both places - when you check it out, a copy is made on your local file system. You make all your changes their and check them in, when you do that a copy is sent up to the server. You always have a copy of the source. The server just tracks all of the changes for you. I'm mostly using Subversion but GIT is pretty popular. I've said "server" but honestly it doesn't even have to be on another machine. You could run everything on the same box, but that makes it a lot more difficult to share with another dev. Having at least one machine always available for you to checking/push code to makes that easier. We use Beanstalk - http://www.beanstalkapp.com - I also run a SVN server on my web server (running on an Amazon EC2 micro instance) using the free version of VisualSVN on the server http://visualsvn.com and TortoiseSVN (which is free) on the client (I run VisualSVN on the client as well (which isn't free) and that adds a nice Visual Studio integration piece, but it's not really needed).
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>>Most source control systems don't require a constant internet connection (well, I know TFS used to but I -think- they fixed that).
>
>My head is spinning <g>. I have to evaluate all these technologies to choose one (too much right now on my plate to even attempt). But I understand - conceptually - things better. The source control makes the source reside in the "cloud" for sharing only. But each dev has a copy on the local drive too. (If I understand this correctly). This makes sense.
>Thank you very much!

You don't have to use the cloud. you can always set up a source control server on your network and avoid the cloud fees and possible cloud or internet disruptions (for you locally anyway).

I use TFS2010 on my network. Works great and allows web access. Not a difficult install either.