notes after the irc chat today...

source control at osaf

The three pain points right now with cvs, improved features we'd like if we changed source control systems:

• easy to back out changes
• sane moving/renaming of files w/out losing history
• decentralized development: easy development on branches, improved branching/merging, disconnected commits, private branches, etc. This is really a tangle of related issues, but boils down to easier cross platform development (check in to your private branch and test cross platform, regular merges with mainline branch), easier collaboration outside of the mainline, more distributed control for large open source projects (not every contributor needs access to the mainline "server").

Features we'd prefer to not lose, that we have now with cvs:

• SmartCVS features
  • graphical diffs
  • easy way of getting list of changed files
  • graphical merging
• tinderbox integration
• bonsai
• view cvs

Other nice to haves

• sane handling of binary files
• python bindings/easy scripting
• manage commit priviledges differently for different parts of the tree

What are the must haves to switch?

-- KatieCappsParlante - 30 Jun 2004