Java Source Safe

> > i second the vote for SVN, and here is the client

> to

> > use with it.

> >

> > http://tortoisesvn.tigris.org/

>

> providing you're on windows, of course :-) nothing

> beats a command-line shell, though

Well, i assumed if the chap was so evil in a past life that he was using VSS in this one, then he was on windows.

dmbdmba at 2007-7-10 3:09:11 >

I'm quite taken with Subversion. The only thing I dislike about it is the ease with which a developer can screw up by moving directories around using the normal (non-svn aware) tools.

There's nothing like discovering that one of your cow-orkers has been happily committing files into a different directory structure from the one on his machine. But at least the situation is generally pretty retrievable with SVN.

Never entirely understood why they couldn't just extend the CVS protocol though. Was that ego driven, or was there really a good reason for it?

dcmintera at 2007-7-10 3:09:11 >

I'm not to thrilled with the "directories as branches" model, but maybe I just need to get used to it and understand it.

Worse, IMAO, is the "it's a label until you check in on it, and then it becomes a branch. To me, a lable and a branch are concptually two very different things, and I don't like that, by default, it's so easy to inadvertently turn one into the other, so that suddenly "build1234" no longer means what I meant it to mean when I created it.

Overall though, very nice. I do like the atomic commits and the repository-wide revision (essentially transaction) numbers.

History across renames is nice too.

jverda at 2007-7-10 3:09:11 >

> > I left my last job after a few weeks because they

> > asked me to run a presentation on why they should

> > move from VSS to SVN, and then gave me a hard time

> > because they didn't like being told the

> shortcomings

> > of VSS. idiots

>

> What were they looking for ?

>

> VSS is great but SVN is incredible ?

no idea. didn't even bother to follow it up, I just decided they weren't for me. I think the exact phrase the dev. director used was "I'd prefer if you didn't try to bully us into using SVN by telling us how bad VSS is" which I didn't, anyway. I only mentioned that VSS has had known problems with large repositories, and provided a screen-shot to demonstrate. I think the truth of the matter was - judging by the instant complaints from nearly all developers - that they couldn't get their heads around concurrent access to source code. try as I would, they never quite got over the fact that file-locking isn't a sure-fire way to ensure nobody corrupts anybody elses code

georgemca at 2007-7-10 3:09:11 >

> can you explain what subversion is? Its just like

> vss? What IDE what I use it for or is it a stand

> alone?

you need to forget about VSS, it's the exception. not many version control tools are so vendor-locked. subversion is a successor to CVS, which is an ancient unix system for controlling versionable documents, like source code. there are plugins for most IDEs to connect to an SVN repository, including Subclipse for (naturally) Eclipse. you can also use command-line tools to access it, or the tortoise Explorer extension on Windows

georgemca at 2007-7-10 3:09:11 >

> I left my last job after a few weeks .... idiots

At least you found out after a few weeks. I knew I was working on a doomed

project once because the (previous) manager had bought into using a complete Oracle

stack from front-end to back-end, including a couple betas technologies, even though they

couldn't even produce a simple sample application for that set up.

Their reasoning was that "we are already an Oracle shop". Er, yes, Oracle *databases*!

DrLaszloJamfa at 2007-7-21 18:18:29 >

> is Subversion the best out of all of them?

That depends on your criteria.

Personally, if I could have any vcs I wanted, without worrying about cost or admin overhead, I'd take ClearCase.

Subversion has the advantages that it's free, based on a system that's been around for a long time and that many people know, has command line, GUI, and IDE-integration clients, and works well on at least windows and unix (maybe others too--have't looked). It has its own quirks, shortcomings, and learning curve though too.

If this is for a school project, then svn is probably a good choice.

jverda at 2007-7-21 18:18:29 >

> Personally, if I could have any vcs I wanted, without

> worrying about cost or admin overhead, I'd take

> ClearCase.

yeah, i use clearcase at work and prefer it to anything as well. Of course it's not my dollars. and you need alot of them greenies with clearcase.

I've also heard folks that i didn't think were idiots say they liked perforce. Never tried it tho.

dmbdmba at 2007-7-21 18:18:29 >

> I've not used most of the commercial alternatives.

> But I can put in a bad word for PVCS, which was the

> antichrist. Pretty scarce these days, thank bog.

I used PVCS at my last gig - no love lost there for sure. I am using Clear Case here, and I have to say that I prefer subversion. I mean, it's still better than PVCS, but that bar's pretty low.

tsitha at 2007-7-21 18:18:29 >