Subversion for dummies

December 5, 2011 2:50 PM

I am trying to get a subversion system set up on an apache server. We do have stuff we can access by using https://s.m.edu/svn but I would like to add that I can access this way (https://s.m.edu/m OR https://s.m.edu/svn/m ) that looks like this (dir names are altered): top level: M below that: V MA MS and below that in each: trunk branch tag What would be the unix / subversion commands to get these set up on the server and what permissions do you need? THANKS
posted by CodeMonkey to computers & internet (6 answers total)

Did some markup get stripped out of your post? I'm unable to figure out the desired behavior from your description. Could you post a follow-up comment with more details?
posted by aparrish at 3:26 PM on December 5, 2011

I would use the apache mod_rewrite module, and do an internal PT (passthrough) rewrite that looked for an incoming /m and rewrote it to /svn/m . You'll need a REWRITECOND directive to make sure you don't rewrite stuff that already has /svn/ in the URL.

http://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/mod/mod_rewrite.html


You'll usually need root permissions on your server to mess with the apache configuration.
posted by jenkinsEar at 3:36 PM on December 5, 2011

Also, not to derail your question, but many professional developers will be a bit miffed at Subversion. It is a terrible old system, most developers who've been developing in the last 5-10 years would vastly prefer Mercurial or Git. Think about it, instead of setting up a lame old system. It's the same level of technical difficulty, and the result will be much more usable for "real" developers, by which I mean people who have modern experience, and haven't been trapped in corporate IT departments for years.

Personally, I do judge companies with which I take programming gigs on the maturity of their source control. Here's the decision tree I use:

- Visual source safe: Completely silly, probably don't have a clue. Add 50% to estimate, hassle to use from my non-Windows development machine. (Yes, I still do get clients who insist on this pile of garbage)
- CVS: Old school, probably curmudgeons on the team, Add 25%.
- SVN: Slightly up to date, but the system stinks, and I can't have an offline branch, add a bit but be suspicious, probably they aren't up to date in other areas. Add 0-20% depending on other clues.
- Bazaar: OK, whatever, at least it isn't SVN. Slow as hell.
- GIT: Yeah!
- Mercurial: Yeah -1. I hope they don't need anything fancy when merging.
posted by Invoke at 5:00 PM on December 5, 2011 [2 favorites]

In SVN, there's nothing special about the directory names trunk, branch, and tag, so you can put those directories at whatever level you like (or omit them entirely). (It seems like half your question was cut off, but it looks like you wanted to ask if you could have /svn/m/v/{trunk,branch,tag}, which is totally fine and needs no configuration in subversion other than make your directories that way.)

While Apache's rewrite rule can absolutely support the other half of your question (top-level svn access via http://s.thing.edu/svn AND http://s.thing.edu/) I do not recommend doing so.
posted by fragmede at 3:53 AM on December 6, 2011

Yes, markup messed up my post. I tried entering breaks but it doesn't work here.
I don't have the option of using anything but what is already here; the subversion person is out sick; the apache admin says "tell me the EXACT commands you want."; I don't know what to tell him but I have to have this set up this week.

What I was hoping for was something like:
1) create your repository by doing: svnadmin create m

I very much don't want to mess up what's there that is why I am hoping for some step by step on this.

I don't have the m and everything under it. Let's take another shot at the tree:
m

ma ms v

trunk branch tag (in ma ms v)
posted by CodeMonkey at 7:06 AM on December 6, 2011

Is http://s.m.edu/svn/ already setup?
posted by fragmede at 3:06 AM on December 7, 2011