What source of control should we use

Question

I am looking for a good version control solution. Here are the requirements:

• Must have a graphical interface or have an accessible graphical interface.
• Must be free.
• Should work with HTTP.

Which control source would you choose?

BACKGROUND

Our .Net development team is part of a large parent company. We are in the process of acquiring VS Team System, but the bureaucracy of a large company is moving slowly, and this may be several months before we start the Team System server. In the meantime, we have a large project that will be transferred to a third-party supplier in India. In the past, our team’s process was something like this: 1) specify requirements, 2) let the Indian team create a solution, and 3) get a solution from the supplier in a month.

We are looking for a more disciplined approach, and Team System is our long-term solution, however I would like to use something right now, and not nothing.

Here are some of my thoughts:

• Source Safe is not-go, due to security issues.
• Ease of use is more important than advanced features such as branching, and I really would like it to use a graphical interface or command lines.
• HTTP access is required as the development team will be removed.

Additional Tracking Information

We need a free solution, not because we cannot afford it, but because corporate procurement policies of the company delay its receipt. Free allows us to install at any time. I believe that if it were cheap enough, I could pay out of my pocket, but that would be pretty cheap.

Final

Unfortunately, we did not use any of the recommendations. Finally, we obtained a TFS license, but we are not expected to have permission to use the server until next year. In the meantime, the offshore team uploads zip files to the ftp server. Ugggghh! Why is it so difficult to convince large companies that using non-standard solutions (for example, GIT) rather than waiting for months (or years) when they are embarrassed when trying to decide whether a purchase (in this case TFS) is worth it.

Answer 1

I recommend Subversion and TortoiseSVN . Even the documentation for Subversion is free.

Edited to add: I also highly recommend VisualSVN Server to configure your SVN repository. The installation was quick, and it was so trouble-free that I had to go see how it was called because I did not have to touch it once since the initial setup.

Answer 2

Think of a distributed system: darcs , git , or mercurial . Everyone has their supporters, but promptly they are very similar. darcs can take a long time because it is written in Haskell, and you need to create Haskell first. Mercurial is based on python, easily cracked and expanded. And, of course, git is what is used for Linux, very widely available, many tools.

Subversion , I think, is pretty much the basic level of modern SCM; it would be a good choice, but it makes you have a fixed central server; either you, or your Indian colleagues, will have to check and complete the long pipe.

Answer 3

Subversion (SVN) is obviously a popular choice. It is also quite often used now (Google Code, Sourceforge, etc.), so there should be a lot of documentation about its use. Git is also a good choice, but the lack of accessible GUIs makes it inadequate for your requirements.

I assume that you are using .NET, which you are developing in the Windows environment in the first place. Browse VisualSVN Products. They make an excellent (FREE) server product for actually launching a full-fledged svn server in a Windows environment (it supports SSL, group / user authentication, including Active Directory support).

They also offer a Visual Studio plugin, although it is not free (although $ 49 / developer is quite reasonable). AnkhSvn is another version of the Visual Studio client plugin. It's not that great, but it's free.

http://www.visualsvn.com/server/ - Free Windows SVN Server

http://www.visualsvn.com/visualsvn/ - Visual Studio Client Plugin

http://ankhsvn.open.collab.net/ - free Visual Studio client plugin

So, I think that Subversion using VisualSVN product offerings will give you better integration with windows / gui at a very reasonable price.

Answer 4

In my experience, SVN doesn't fit well with HTTP. You will want to pull your hair out if your repo is of any significant size, especially as there is a transatlantic round trip. Personally, I would go with Mercurial.

Google recently did some research on Git compared to Mercurial. The biggest advantage Mercurial had was that it worked great with HTTP.

TortoiseHg, although not as mature as TortoiseSVN, is a pretty solid Windows GUI. Although you mentioned that you are not very interested in branching and merging, these are common actions in all DVCS. Fortunately, since they are common, they are well supported in the user interface and relatively painless in general.

Answer 5

Team Foundation Server is fairly easy to use, and it's easy to get started with the source safe backgrounds (common general terminology for teams). However, with some of the development in India, they may be more aware of Subversion.

If you are using Subversion, I would look at VisualSVN . This is a fantastic, easy-to-use and quick way to configure (TFS is a little tricky to configure). VisualSVN offers an IDE plug-in ($ 50) and a server instance that downloads Subversion for window machines (free)

Answer 6

Check out Subversion: http://subversion.tigris.org/

There is a graphical plugin, as well as VS.NET. http://tortoisesvn.tigris.org/ http://ankhsvn.open.collab.net/

All are open source and free.

Answer 7

My recommendation is Subversion + TortoiseSVN (for integration with Explorer) + AnkhSVN (integration with Visual Studio).

I think you should not use any version control system of distributions, because after that you will have to return to centralized, which can be painful.

Answer 8

As mentioned, SVN and Tortoise are the way to go.

I also got a visual SVN license ( http://www.visualsvn.com/ ), it’s not free, but it’s really good, it uses Tortoise svn and provides you with its features in the IDE.

Answer 9

Mercurial is great and very easy.

Answer 10

Give a mercurial shot. BitBucket has free accounts with which you can play. I wrote more about why I use it here .

Answer 11

Have you tried SVN and used TortoiseSVN to extend the shell?

Answer 12

I second SVN and TortoiseSVN.

I switched from CVS and WinCVS, and I am very pleased with this setting.

Answer 13

I would recommend a source control in which most of your team members have the most experience or where you have someone from your team who is an expert.

In my opinion, apart from the endless "git is better than Subversion is better than CVS" - discussion, I don't think the difference between them is important.

It is more important that someone really knows how to use any system that you decide to use.

Answer 14

Configuring Subversion for .NET development has become easier. You can start by installing Visual SVN Server . This will install Subversion Server on the Windows machine, you can configure the repository, authentication, etc.

Then, to integrate Visual Studio with Subversion, you can try VisualSVN , it’s not free, but it costs a license. But if your budget does not allow, Ankhsvn also works great, I use it every day.

Answer 15

I should have made a similar decision a few months ago. I really liked SVN, but the lack of a GUI for administration was a big problem for my team. TFS was perfect but very expensive.

We decided to meet in half and get a SourceGear Vault license. This does not meet your requirements "for free", unfortunately. Although I found its comparison with SVN to be interesting.

Answer 16

If you are sure that you are going to Team System, I believe that you can use the 180-day trial version. Thus, you should not switch.

Answer 17

You tried to disable ( http://unfuddle.com/ ). Fulfills all your requirements.

Answer 18

Another vote for SVN.
For a lightweight SVN server, see sliksvn in the windows. It does not work with an HTTP browser, but is much smaller and simpler than apache-based servers for small groups.