Version control for web sites...

[Charles Steinkuehler]

Brig C. McCoy wrote:

> Hi...
> 
> I'm interested in implementing version control for our web site
> development work, including configuration files.
> 
> We're on Redhat Enterprise 3 with Apache.
> 
> I've worked with sccs in the past (hey, I'm old, deal) and still have
> the night terrors.
> 
> Obviously cvs would do the job, but I'd like to find something less
> complicated for the Windows-biased members of my staff.
> 
> Anyone have any experience with subversion? Any other suggestions?

As everyone else mentioned, subversion rocks!

One feature no one else mentioned that you might find handy is subversion 
*NEVER* does anything to your files, they're always handled '8-bit clean'.

That means no EOL line munging, no inserting magic text for special tags in 
the file, and no special tagging of files required to avoid corruption!

I find this *VERY* handy when versioning files from custom CAD tools, which 
tend to be a mix of ascii-only and propriatery binary formats.  This would 
probably also be helpful in versioning websites, as you won't have to worry 
about image files, binary downloads, etc. being munged.

NOTE:  Subversion still stores a 'tag' that describes the file-type along 
with the file (think mime-type and you're not far off), but regardless of 
what subversion thinks the file-type is, it's always '8-bit clean'.

-- 
Charles Steinkuehler
charles at steinkuehler.net