The simplest version control system

Question

I want to configure a source code management system that:

• connected to the network, so users can access it at work or on the go.
• no sharing required, lock mode sufficient
• there will be only three users, and they will never work with the same code.
• we do not have a system administrator and little knowledge in this area, so the setup and configuration should be simple.
• will be installed on the windows server
• open source or free

Suggestions please.

Answer 1

SVN covers all of these features and is pretty easy to configure.

Point 2 access points are generally better than locking, as a file that is locked by someone who then goes on vacation / dies / etc. must be unlocked by someone before he can work as another developer. SVN supports out-of-box sharing.

Answer 2

SIMPLEST is what we call the Hey Chris system here. We have a network drive that anyone can mount, and if you want to edit something you like: "Hey Chris, are you working on blahblah.cpp?" and Chris says no. and then you edit blahblah.cpp and paste it back onto the shared drive ... If you need versions, just back up your network drive every night.

I never said that this is the best system, just the simplest.

Answer 3

Mercurial or Git

Answer 4

Try Subversion (svn) .

Edit: Rich beat me up to this = D. And yes, because he indicates that sharing is better than blocking. It looks like you are a SourceSafe user. These were the same problems that I tried to solve when exiting SourceSafe =)

Answer 5

I can only add my voice to the "use subversion" chorus. But you also asked about easy installation and administration .

For this, I would like to point you to VisualSVN Server . This is an easy to use server setup on Windows. And it's free.

Or, if you want to go with manual configuration (perhaps because you do not want to use Apache with visualsvn server), follow Jeff Configuring Subversion on Windows .

Answer 6

I recommend Toroise SVN . SVN is a version control environment that is easy to configure and use on Windows, and Tortoise is an add-on that integrates with Windows Explorer.

Although it is easy to use, it allows different people to work in one file and combine their changes. Even if this “cannot happen,” I predict that at some point you will be happy that it works that way.

Answer 7

I really dig Git and GitHub for this. Git is nice because every developer can check things and view history even when they are offline (say, on an airplane or off the beaten path somewhere), and then make their changes to the central repository when they are back online. GitHub works really, really well, like this central repository, and includes many very handy tools for viewing and commenting on other people's checks.

The basic commands that you use day after day come down to:

git add . git commit -m "this is a note" git pull origin master git push 

Git handles most conflicts very quickly and quickly, as the entire repository is on every machine.

Kyle Cordes wrote a blog post about getting started on Windows.

Answer 8

Darcs provides all this and more. This is a distributed version distribution system that will simplify access to data on the road. You can send / receive patches (similar to the changes) via email or ssh.

The thing about the gifts that I like the most is that it is really verbose. He is really trying to help you.

Answer 9

Lots of recommendations for SVN, but I'm not sure I would call it “the simplest” from an administrator’s point of view. You still need to configure the server, IIRC. In comparison, DVCS, such as Mercurial, makes no distinction between a “repository” and a “working copy”. To put something on the server (which can be any folder that you have access to files for), you can simply "click" there.

You also mention work on the road. DVCS are especially good at this. Your laptop will have an entire history, so you only need to touch the server if you want to push or pull, and not just make the difference or check the history.

Answer 10

The simplest version control system I know of is the RCS version control system . This is a command line utility available out of the box on Linux systems. It is pretty simple.

At first. Inside the current directory, create the directory in which the RCS information will be stored:

 $ mkdir RCS 

The second. Store (register) the file in RCS:

 $ ci -t-"My notes" notes.txt 

The original file is deleted.

Third. Restore source file with RCS:

 $ co -u notes.txt 

Fourth. Edit the file as needed, now it can be restored at any time:

 $ vim notes.txt 

RCS also works with binary files and supports many subsequent changes to the file.