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Blog Entry
Setting up SVN on OSX Leopard
Published on the 6th of August 2008
When I got my new Macbook, I knew that I wanted to setup a better system to control all of the source code on my computer. I have websites and applications for clients, Lowter, etc. Basically, I have a lot of code that was only loosely organised on my old iMac. On my iMac, I had everything organised nicely into folders, but that was about it. I had CVS setup, as it was built into OSX Tiger, but I did not make much use of it because it was too complex.
I found out that SVN is built into OSX Leopard, rather than CVS. I really don't want to start a CVS-vs.-SVN argument, but I just do not like CVS. SVN is easier to use and I am more acclimated to using it because a few of my clients use SVN already. Searching on Google, I found an amazing tutorial on how to setup SVN on OSX Leopard (external link), which I highly recommend. I followed the tutorial and now SVN is up and running on my system, with all of my code stored neatly into repositories.
If you are looking to setup a versioning system for your source code, I highly recommend SVN instead of CVS. SVN was easy to setup and is easy to work with, especially compared to the complexity I encountered trying to maintain a CVS code repository. Apple made a good move to include SVN in OSX Leopard instead of CVS.
Comments
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Eugene Wee (6 Aug 2008 13:15)
Use Bazaar! Just kidding, unless you are serious on using a distributed version control system. That said, Bazaar's Mac OS X 10.5 installer did make it easy for my project group member to install Bazaar on his Macbook running OS X Leopard.
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Matt Oakes (external link) (6 Aug 2008 18:39)
I use TortoiseSVN on windows visa. Perfect little tool. No command line at all which mades it dead simple to use. Almost everything is controlled through the right click menu: updating, commiting, merging/tagging. Plus to have a diff program build in so you can see changes made to files between revisions. Single best program I have on my laptop.
I'm just getting the hang of branching off the trunk for big changes and then merging back into it after making the changes. Takes a bit of getting used to compared to just editting the trunk for everything.
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Tom (external link) (6 Aug 2008 18:50)
If you are looking for an SVN to use if you are on Windows then I would highly recommend Tortoise SVN (http://tortoisesvn.tigris.org/) It integrates into Windows so is not IDE dependent and works very well.
On a side note for SVN, do not add compiled files to your repository (just source code, project files, etc.) as this can cause issues.
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Ethan Poole (external link) (6 Aug 2008 19:49)
I just use the command line, but I know that svnX (http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/development_tools/svnx.html) is pretty good for a nice interface. TortoiseSVN is also really nice if you're on Windows.
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Eugene Wee (7 Aug 2008 7:15)
The tip about not adding compiled files (or generated files of any kind) to ones repository (or branch, as the case may be) applies to version control in general, though in some cases it may be impractical to avoid doing so.
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Matt Oakes (external link) (7 Aug 2008 12:35)
I mainly work with interpreted languages so compiled stuff isn't an issie for me at all.
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