Re: [boost] Moving from CVS to Subversion?

From: Walter Landry (wlandry_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-01-31 23:19:32

David Abrahams <dave_at_[hidden]> wrote:
> 
> I am just posting this here to alert those who look at subject lines
> to what we're discussing.  To review the whole discussion, see
> http://news.gmane.org/find-root.php?message_id=%3cuk6pujjyu.fsf%40boost%2dconsulting.com%3e

One thread you might find interesting

  http://news.gmane.org/find-root.php?group=gmane.comp.version-control.subversion.devel&article=53583

It talks about the troubles Mono had in going from CVS to Subversion.
YMMV.

My personal opinion is that, if you want a centralized version control
system, you aren't going to do significantly better than Subversion.
There are a fair number of large projects using it, and, especially
with the new fsfs backend, it seems to work pretty well for most
people.

However, I am not a big fan of centralized version control, and vastly
prefer a distributed approach.  Distributed systems let people use
version control when they are not connected to a central server, so
when the server goes down you can still get work down.  So the problem
that spawned this thread about a CVS lock is much less of an issue.
In fact, if the central server goes down unexpectedly, it is
relatively easy to set up a new server somewhere else.

Also, it is much easier for people to make private branches and
contribute changes.  No one needs accounts just to get work done.
This blog entry summarizes it rather well

  http://web.verbum.org/blog/freesoftware/distributed-future

In any case, there are a few different free decentralized version
control systems.

  Darcs         www.darcs.net
  Very easy to use.  Fairly mature with good windows support,
  but it has some performance problems.  It will probably have
  problems with a project the size of Boost.

  tla           wiki.gnuarch.org
  Mature, but overly complex and has some annoying limitations.  The
  windows client is definitely a second-class citizen.  Should be fast
  enough for Boost.

  Monotone      www.venge.net/monotone
  Beta.  Windows support is relatively good.  Well engineered,
  but unsure about speed with Boost.

  svk           svk.elixus.org
  Beta.  Adds distributed capabilities to subversion.  It is the Rodney
  Dangerfield of version control systems: it doesn't get any respect.
  However, I don't see any obvious problems with it.

  ArX           www.nongnu.org/arx/
  Beta.  This is my personal project.  Windows requires cygwin.
  I personally use it to version control Boost, and it works well for
  me.  In fact, it is probably the fastest of all of these for most
  common local operations.

There are other differences, but I will spare you the details.

Realistically, no change will work unless a major contributor to Boost
gets religion and invests some time in learning one of them.  All of
these systems, including Subversion, have their annoying differences
from CVS.  It sounds like Subversion has such a convert with David
Abrahams.

Cheers,
Walter Landry
wlandry_at_[hidden]