posted @ Monday, May 12, 2008 7:59 AM by SkySigal

Why use Source Control

• Without source control, you will eventually lose things, step on others work, and lose friends:
• Team members get really mad at you.
• Loss of part or all your code.
• Overwriting changes.
• Duplicated effort.
• Inability to go back to a working copy.
  
  
  
• With source control:
• Keep track of:
• Who did what, when, and why
• Changes between releases
• Allows remote workers to work safely on code without conflict
• Find src as previously shipped

 

The Why use Subversion for your Source Control

• “An open-source revision control system…compelling replacement for CVS".
• Pros
  • Single changeset checkins: all modified files are checked in as a single transaction, or none of them are. Subversion rolls back a partially completed check-in should a problem occur.
  • Supports check-ins of entire directories as a single commit.
  • Supports metadata—either text or binary—that can be associated with any and all files.
  • Easy, inexpensive branching and tagging.
  • Multiple networking protocols
  • Portable Server: more platforms than CVS, an Apache 2.xmodule , etc.
  • The fact that it's free and open-source is just a bonus.
• Cons:
• None? 

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ServerSide Installation

• Installing the binaries:
• Download from http://subversion.tigris.org
• Unpack it to c:/Program Files/Subversion
• Contains several exes (svnadmin,svnserve, etc.)
• Note: It’s a ‘green’ application (doesn't affect registry) -- so you can move it around later.
• Designate a server root directory: e:/VC/MyRepos
  • Tip: It should NOT be on your C:\ drive…Its data.
• Use the CommandLine to create at least one Repository:
  • svnadmin create R:/VC/MyRepos/NETPROJECTS
  • svnadmin create R:/VC/MyRepos/NETSTUDIES
• Optionally open TCP port 3690 for svn:// protocol

 

BTW: What's in a Repositories?

• …in the server’s root directory…
• …you just created two ‘repository’ directories…
• …what’s in them?
• Just a set of directories that svnserve manages as a FS DB:
  
    
  
  Note: one is the DB (your files), one being for configuration

 

Configuring Rights per Repository

• Each User needs to be first granted Access (even you):
• Go to the E:/vc/MyRepos/NetProjects directory/repository,
• In the Repository, find the conf-iguration dir,
• Within that, find and edit the svnserve.conf INI file,
• Edit the passwrd file it points to, and add Users (that’s you…):

 

• The svnserve.conf might be edited to look like this:
  
[general]
anon-access = read
auth-access = write
…
password-db = passwd
…
# authz-db = authz


• Edit the passwrd file and add Users=Passwords:
  
[users]
…
john=happycamper
betty=happiercamper
…

Running the Server

• The install package’s bin dir contained several exe’s.
  • We’ve already used svnadmin.exe once...
  • And there’s the server itself, called svnservice.exe.
• It (svnserve.exe) can be started from the command prompt:
  • svnserve -install -daemon –root E:\VC\MyRepos
• Starts listening for requests to the repos in the specified root dir.
  • Tip: You probably should try it once just to see that you don’t get error messages and clear that up…
• But what you really want is to install SVNService:
  • http://www.lw-works.com/svnservice
  • Ensure SVNService startup changed from Manual to Automatic
  • Note: Since ver 1.4 no longer needed, but harder than SVNService.

ServerSide Installation and Configuration Done.

• At this point, the server side is done. You have:
  • A repository root directory,
  • with one or more repositories in it,
  • a server (svnserve.exe) that is
  • managing access to it (via passwd and authz files)
  • Listening on a TCP port (3690).
  • And a service (SVNService) to start it every time you reboot
• All its doing now is waiting for someone to ring home…
  • Note: Home users should consider http://dyndns.net
    

Or do it all the easy way…

 

but ... note that it does not support the default svn protocol:

It's your choice...

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Now on to the clientside of things...