Switch from Source Safe to Subversion?
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The last project I worked on required me to install and use Subversion / Tortoise, which from a user's point of view was relatively painless. I've been using Source Safe at home for all of my personal projects since the early 90s. At this point, I'm wondering if it's worthwhile to move everything switch over to Subversion. If I make the switch, I suspect I can kiss my revision history in Source Safe goodbye as I doubt that there's a way to port it to Subversion. However, I'm also wondering how easy it is to use from an administrative point of view (configuration, creating projects, etc.) rather than just checking stuff in and out. Although I've never completely trusted the database stability, for single user projects Source Safe is drop dead simple to use. Thoughts, anyone?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
If you're using the svnserve.exe server, setup and administration is really easy. Just make a directory for all of your repositories, open it up in Windows Explorer, make a directory for each repository, open each directory, and use the Tortoise menu option "Create Repository Here". Register svnserve as a Windows Service with the root repository directory as one of the command line arguments and Tortoise can now connect to your (empty) repositories. This is the easiest way to set up a home source control system, and it's what I'm running on my home computer now. Really, your best bet is to read the Subversion guide here[^] for more details. It tells you just about everything you need to know about source control in general and using Subversion in specific.
Please don't bother me... I'm hacking code right now. Doesn't anybody remember what "hacking" really means? :sigh:
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The last project I worked on required me to install and use Subversion / Tortoise, which from a user's point of view was relatively painless. I've been using Source Safe at home for all of my personal projects since the early 90s. At this point, I'm wondering if it's worthwhile to move everything switch over to Subversion. If I make the switch, I suspect I can kiss my revision history in Source Safe goodbye as I doubt that there's a way to port it to Subversion. However, I'm also wondering how easy it is to use from an administrative point of view (configuration, creating projects, etc.) rather than just checking stuff in and out. Although I've never completely trusted the database stability, for single user projects Source Safe is drop dead simple to use. Thoughts, anyone?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
Christopher Duncan wrote:
I suspect I can kiss my revision history in Source Safe goodbye as I doubt that there's a way to port it to Subversion
not necessarily. Since subversion can ignore certain files, you focus on your source files and there is a process to move the history too. The only person I know of who successfully did this wrote his own python or perl script (I never could keep up with those two, so I don't know which one). He pulled a history of his project put it in the script and it ran something like this: check out 1.0 ss check in sub check out 1.1 ss check in sub check out 1.2 ss check in sub... etc. etc. since it was a script and written for his version history, it wasn't portible to anyone else, but it got the job done, and did it well. I use subversion in a scratchbox setting (local database on another drive). :)
_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
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Christopher Duncan wrote:
I suspect I can kiss my revision history in Source Safe goodbye as I doubt that there's a way to port it to Subversion
not necessarily. Since subversion can ignore certain files, you focus on your source files and there is a process to move the history too. The only person I know of who successfully did this wrote his own python or perl script (I never could keep up with those two, so I don't know which one). He pulled a history of his project put it in the script and it ran something like this: check out 1.0 ss check in sub check out 1.1 ss check in sub check out 1.2 ss check in sub... etc. etc. since it was a script and written for his version history, it wasn't portible to anyone else, but it got the job done, and did it well. I use subversion in a scratchbox setting (local database on another drive). :)
_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
El Corazon wrote:
I use subversion in a scratchbox setting (local database on another drive).
Okay, you completely lost me on this one. Scratchbox? Isn't that something the cat uses which requires ample doses of kitty litter?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
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The last project I worked on required me to install and use Subversion / Tortoise, which from a user's point of view was relatively painless. I've been using Source Safe at home for all of my personal projects since the early 90s. At this point, I'm wondering if it's worthwhile to move everything switch over to Subversion. If I make the switch, I suspect I can kiss my revision history in Source Safe goodbye as I doubt that there's a way to port it to Subversion. However, I'm also wondering how easy it is to use from an administrative point of view (configuration, creating projects, etc.) rather than just checking stuff in and out. Although I've never completely trusted the database stability, for single user projects Source Safe is drop dead simple to use. Thoughts, anyone?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
No help with your problem - btu the biggest problem I have with a switch is that people actually insist on keeping the exclusive checkout. I don't know what to make of that.
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
My first real C# project | Linkify!|FoldWithUs! | sighist -
No help with your problem - btu the biggest problem I have with a switch is that people actually insist on keeping the exclusive checkout. I don't know what to make of that.
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
My first real C# project | Linkify!|FoldWithUs! | sighistA not completely unfounded paranoia from those who have been bitten in the past by a merge, no doubt.
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
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El Corazon wrote:
I use subversion in a scratchbox setting (local database on another drive).
Okay, you completely lost me on this one. Scratchbox? Isn't that something the cat uses which requires ample doses of kitty litter?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
Christopher Duncan wrote:
Okay, you completely lost me on this one.
scratch box is where you can play with ideas before submission to a full-out source control. I actually use multiple subversion systems, my scratchboard has non-working revisions included, where-as the company one requires "expected" working versons uploaded. Sometimes you break the company build with a change, but not often. when you run multiple revision control systems on the same code, a local database, one not on a network server is called a scratch box.... not sure where the term comes from, but used it for many years.... maybe I even accidentally coined it and forgot about it. Maybe from practicing calligraphy in the sand.... I do calligraphy too. :doh:
_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
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Christopher Duncan wrote:
Okay, you completely lost me on this one.
scratch box is where you can play with ideas before submission to a full-out source control. I actually use multiple subversion systems, my scratchboard has non-working revisions included, where-as the company one requires "expected" working versons uploaded. Sometimes you break the company build with a change, but not often. when you run multiple revision control systems on the same code, a local database, one not on a network server is called a scratch box.... not sure where the term comes from, but used it for many years.... maybe I even accidentally coined it and forgot about it. Maybe from practicing calligraphy in the sand.... I do calligraphy too. :doh:
_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
Ah, makes sense. I did that with my local vss and the production subversion system.
El Corazon wrote:
Maybe from practicing calligraphy in the sand....
...must...restrain...kitty...litter...metaphors... :-D
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
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Ah, makes sense. I did that with my local vss and the production subversion system.
El Corazon wrote:
Maybe from practicing calligraphy in the sand....
...must...restrain...kitty...litter...metaphors... :-D
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
Christopher Duncan wrote:
...must...restrain...kitty...litter...metaphors...
must... hide... the... fact... my... first... internet... handle... was... The Samurai Cat
_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
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Christopher Duncan wrote:
...must...restrain...kitty...litter...metaphors...
must... hide... the... fact... my... first... internet... handle... was... The Samurai Cat
_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: Hai, Corazon san! :-D
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
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The last project I worked on required me to install and use Subversion / Tortoise, which from a user's point of view was relatively painless. I've been using Source Safe at home for all of my personal projects since the early 90s. At this point, I'm wondering if it's worthwhile to move everything switch over to Subversion. If I make the switch, I suspect I can kiss my revision history in Source Safe goodbye as I doubt that there's a way to port it to Subversion. However, I'm also wondering how easy it is to use from an administrative point of view (configuration, creating projects, etc.) rather than just checking stuff in and out. Although I've never completely trusted the database stability, for single user projects Source Safe is drop dead simple to use. Thoughts, anyone?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
There is a tool that converts version hostory to SVN. Actually there are two such tools. The problem they don't seem to work for big projects. I could not get either of them to work. So I abandoned use of SubVersion for existing project. Instead I am using SVN for a brand new project.
Co-Author ASP.NET AJAX in Action
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The last project I worked on required me to install and use Subversion / Tortoise, which from a user's point of view was relatively painless. I've been using Source Safe at home for all of my personal projects since the early 90s. At this point, I'm wondering if it's worthwhile to move everything switch over to Subversion. If I make the switch, I suspect I can kiss my revision history in Source Safe goodbye as I doubt that there's a way to port it to Subversion. However, I'm also wondering how easy it is to use from an administrative point of view (configuration, creating projects, etc.) rather than just checking stuff in and out. Although I've never completely trusted the database stability, for single user projects Source Safe is drop dead simple to use. Thoughts, anyone?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
Do it. You won't look back. The fact that your source control database doesn't get corrupted more than makes up for a little bit of lost revision history.
Deja View - the feeling that you've seen this post before.
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Christopher Duncan wrote:
Okay, you completely lost me on this one.
scratch box is where you can play with ideas before submission to a full-out source control. I actually use multiple subversion systems, my scratchboard has non-working revisions included, where-as the company one requires "expected" working versons uploaded. Sometimes you break the company build with a change, but not often. when you run multiple revision control systems on the same code, a local database, one not on a network server is called a scratch box.... not sure where the term comes from, but used it for many years.... maybe I even accidentally coined it and forgot about it. Maybe from practicing calligraphy in the sand.... I do calligraphy too. :doh:
_________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
El Corazon wrote:
scratch box is where you can play with ideas before submission to a full-out source control. I actually use multiple subversion systems, my scratchboard has non-working revisions included, where-as the company one requires "expected" working versons uploaded. Sometimes you break the company build with a change, but not often.
Ummm, isn't that called a branch?
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If you're using the svnserve.exe server, setup and administration is really easy. Just make a directory for all of your repositories, open it up in Windows Explorer, make a directory for each repository, open each directory, and use the Tortoise menu option "Create Repository Here". Register svnserve as a Windows Service with the root repository directory as one of the command line arguments and Tortoise can now connect to your (empty) repositories. This is the easiest way to set up a home source control system, and it's what I'm running on my home computer now. Really, your best bet is to read the Subversion guide here[^] for more details. It tells you just about everything you need to know about source control in general and using Subversion in specific.
Please don't bother me... I'm hacking code right now. Doesn't anybody remember what "hacking" really means? :sigh:
Robert Royall wrote:
Really, your best bet is to read the Subversion guide here[^] for more details. It tells you just about everything you need to know about source control in general and using Subversion in specific.
For windows users, I would also recommend the TortoiseSVN docs, which covers a lot of the Subversion features as they relate to a windows environment, and they also cover setting up the various Subversion servers (full disclosure: I wrote most of the svnserve setup:)
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No help with your problem - btu the biggest problem I have with a switch is that people actually insist on keeping the exclusive checkout. I don't know what to make of that.
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
My first real C# project | Linkify!|FoldWithUs! | sighistpeterchen wrote:
exclusive checkout
We do the whole exclusive checkout/checkin thing where I work - but it's a safety critical project where there's only meant to be one person working on a particular bit of code at any one time anyway, so it matches our workflow. We don't use Subversion (or Sourcesafe, I hasten to add!!) either, but that's a whole other story.
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The last project I worked on required me to install and use Subversion / Tortoise, which from a user's point of view was relatively painless. I've been using Source Safe at home for all of my personal projects since the early 90s. At this point, I'm wondering if it's worthwhile to move everything switch over to Subversion. If I make the switch, I suspect I can kiss my revision history in Source Safe goodbye as I doubt that there's a way to port it to Subversion. However, I'm also wondering how easy it is to use from an administrative point of view (configuration, creating projects, etc.) rather than just checking stuff in and out. Although I've never completely trusted the database stability, for single user projects Source Safe is drop dead simple to use. Thoughts, anyone?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
Christopher Duncan wrote:
However, I'm also wondering how easy it is to use from an administrative point of view (configuration, creating projects, etc.) rather than just checking stuff in and out.
Dead easy - the hardest configuration is using SVN through Apache - and even that's pretty much painless. I set up SVN and Trac (SCM and problem reporting) on a Win XP both in about 1-2hours - that includes download and install of Apache, SVN, Trac and all their dependencies. I've been playing with Git[^] a bit as well - it's allegedly the best distributed VCS at the moment - despite its obvious Unix bias (its primary developer was Linus Torvalds, after all), the Windows version seems to work adequately and was painless to install. You don't even need to use MinGW sh, despite the fact that they imply you do.
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Do it. You won't look back. The fact that your source control database doesn't get corrupted more than makes up for a little bit of lost revision history.
Deja View - the feeling that you've seen this post before.
This is funny because I actually switched to Source Safe from Subversion earlier this year. I have used Subversion for multiple projects over the last 3 years at two companies. I actually led a project to implement Subversion as the source control solution for a multinational financial institution's Polish branch. But we were coding in Delphi, SQL Server, some PHP, but very little .NET back then. And RPG on iSeries (though not me) - Subversion also works for that, there's a plugin for Eclipse called Subclipse. Then a few months ago I started my own business and moved to .NET world which interested me, so I started using Visual Studio. Subversion had nice integration with Windows shell, but it couldn't be embedded in my developer IDE... And Visual Source Safe had that feature. It was easier, I could just click in the Solution Explorer and check-out/check-in single or multiple files and do other source control stuff. So I uninstalled SVN, backed up my repos and sticked with Source Safe ever since. I think it's a matter of one's needs. If you are using Microsoft tools exclusively - I would go for Source Safe (Or SourceGear? :) It's free for 1 dev). If you, however, use non-Microsoft tools, Subversion is a better choice - it won't integrate, but neither will Source Safe (usually). These are my two cents. And, by the way, anyone knows of a way to integrate Subversion with Visual Studio? Perhaps I'm just ignorant and don't know of it - if there was a way to fully integrate SVN I might take a second look at it. Ah, another thing I don't like about SVN is Apache. ;P I am using IIS for all my web projects (ASP.NET, even PHP) and don't want to run another HTTP server just for the sake of SVN. I remember it was also difficult to estabilish Active Directory based authentication and the auth rules (as described in SVN ebook) make you store usernames and passwords in a plain text file. :| Regards, Pawel Krakowiak
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This is funny because I actually switched to Source Safe from Subversion earlier this year. I have used Subversion for multiple projects over the last 3 years at two companies. I actually led a project to implement Subversion as the source control solution for a multinational financial institution's Polish branch. But we were coding in Delphi, SQL Server, some PHP, but very little .NET back then. And RPG on iSeries (though not me) - Subversion also works for that, there's a plugin for Eclipse called Subclipse. Then a few months ago I started my own business and moved to .NET world which interested me, so I started using Visual Studio. Subversion had nice integration with Windows shell, but it couldn't be embedded in my developer IDE... And Visual Source Safe had that feature. It was easier, I could just click in the Solution Explorer and check-out/check-in single or multiple files and do other source control stuff. So I uninstalled SVN, backed up my repos and sticked with Source Safe ever since. I think it's a matter of one's needs. If you are using Microsoft tools exclusively - I would go for Source Safe (Or SourceGear? :) It's free for 1 dev). If you, however, use non-Microsoft tools, Subversion is a better choice - it won't integrate, but neither will Source Safe (usually). These are my two cents. And, by the way, anyone knows of a way to integrate Subversion with Visual Studio? Perhaps I'm just ignorant and don't know of it - if there was a way to fully integrate SVN I might take a second look at it. Ah, another thing I don't like about SVN is Apache. ;P I am using IIS for all my web projects (ASP.NET, even PHP) and don't want to run another HTTP server just for the sake of SVN. I remember it was also difficult to estabilish Active Directory based authentication and the auth rules (as described in SVN ebook) make you store usernames and passwords in a plain text file. :| Regards, Pawel Krakowiak
For me, the issue is more to do with the reliability of the source database and the ease of managing multiple developers on single projects. It's merge control is far superior to VSS. Oh well.
Deja View - the feeling that you've seen this post before.
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No help with your problem - btu the biggest problem I have with a switch is that people actually insist on keeping the exclusive checkout. I don't know what to make of that.
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
My first real C# project | Linkify!|FoldWithUs! | sighistThough I never used locks myself with svn (no need), you may enforce locks. From svn-book (at the end of "The Copy-Modify-Merge Solution" chapter) : "When Locking is Necessary ... While Subversion is still primarily a copy-modify-merge system, it still recognizes the need to lock an occasional file and thus provide mechanisms for this. This feature is discussed later in this book, in the section called “Locking”." Moreover : - you can use hook scripts on the subversion server in order to customize processing; - you can use a property named svn:needs-lock (property = meta-data attached to versionned objects) in order to ease work. More info on that subject : - http://svnbook.red-bean.com/en/1.4/svn-book.html#svn.advanced.locking - http://svnbook.red-bean.com/en/1.4/svn-book.html#svn.basic.vsn-models.lock-unlock - http://svnbook.red-bean.com/en/1.4/svn-book.html#svn.basic.vsn-models.copy-merge
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For me, the issue is more to do with the reliability of the source database and the ease of managing multiple developers on single projects. It's merge control is far superior to VSS. Oh well.
Deja View - the feeling that you've seen this post before.
It's merge control is far superior to VSS. Yes, it is. I agree. The diff tool in VSS sucks, honestly.
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This is funny because I actually switched to Source Safe from Subversion earlier this year. I have used Subversion for multiple projects over the last 3 years at two companies. I actually led a project to implement Subversion as the source control solution for a multinational financial institution's Polish branch. But we were coding in Delphi, SQL Server, some PHP, but very little .NET back then. And RPG on iSeries (though not me) - Subversion also works for that, there's a plugin for Eclipse called Subclipse. Then a few months ago I started my own business and moved to .NET world which interested me, so I started using Visual Studio. Subversion had nice integration with Windows shell, but it couldn't be embedded in my developer IDE... And Visual Source Safe had that feature. It was easier, I could just click in the Solution Explorer and check-out/check-in single or multiple files and do other source control stuff. So I uninstalled SVN, backed up my repos and sticked with Source Safe ever since. I think it's a matter of one's needs. If you are using Microsoft tools exclusively - I would go for Source Safe (Or SourceGear? :) It's free for 1 dev). If you, however, use non-Microsoft tools, Subversion is a better choice - it won't integrate, but neither will Source Safe (usually). These are my two cents. And, by the way, anyone knows of a way to integrate Subversion with Visual Studio? Perhaps I'm just ignorant and don't know of it - if there was a way to fully integrate SVN I might take a second look at it. Ah, another thing I don't like about SVN is Apache. ;P I am using IIS for all my web projects (ASP.NET, even PHP) and don't want to run another HTTP server just for the sake of SVN. I remember it was also difficult to estabilish Active Directory based authentication and the auth rules (as described in SVN ebook) make you store usernames and passwords in a plain text file. :| Regards, Pawel Krakowiak