Comparison between Bazaar and ClearCase

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SCM feature: Bazaar ClearCase Add to comparison: +CVS
+AccuRev
+Aegis
+AllChange
+Arch
+BitKeeper
+CM+
+CMSynergy
+Co-Op
+Darcs
+Git
+LibreSource Synchronizer
+Mercurial
+Monotone
+OpenCM
+Perforce
+PureCM
+SourceAnywhere
+Subversion
+Superversion
+Surround SCM
+svk
+Team Foundation Server
+Vesta
+Visual SourceSafe
Atomic Commits
Yes. Commits are atomic. Yes. Commits (checkins) are atomic.
Files and Directories Moves or Renames
Yes. Renames are supported for files and directories. Yes. Directories are first-class controlled entities in Clearcase. Even supports controlling of symbolic/hard links.
Intelligent Merging after Moves or Renames
Yes. Renames are intelligent. Unknown. FILL IN.
File and Directories Copies
No. Copies are not supported. Yes, through use of hard links. (But some limitations in Windows environments)
Remote Repository Replication
Yes. Not really applicable for clearcase, but see next point.
Propagating Changes to Parent Repositories
Yes. Yes, using Clearcase Multisite.
Repository Permissions
Basic access control can be implemented through a contributed hook script. ACL support for the Bazaar server is planned. Yes, a unix-like permissions model is used, which maps onto Windows domain-based authentication in multi-platform environments.
Changesets' Support
Yes. Changesets are supported. Not supported in this way. Extensive branching support gives similar benefits. (eg each changeset can be given a branch). Also optional UCM feature gives something like this (each changeset is a "stream").
Tracking Line-wise File History
Yes. (bzr annotate). Yes, "cleartool annotate"
Ability to Work only on One Directory of the Repository
For checkouts: No. For checkins: Yes. Yes, using snapshot view load rules.
Tracking Uncommited Changes
Yes, using "bzr diff". Yes, "cleartool diff"
Per-File Commit Messages
With respect to pure Bazaar: No. At least one plugin (bzr-gtk) supports it though. Yes, assuming a comment on the branch is sufficient for a per-changeset message.
Documentation
Excellent. Apart from online help in the command line client there exist tutorials, a reference card ("Quick Start Guide"), several full fledged guides and references, and documents on specialized topics, such as migration from other VCS systems and different workflows. The documentation comes in html and plain-text formats. The API of the underlying library is fully documented. In the UI design of the command line client special attention was paid to make it easy to get started with Bazaar. Extensive online help in Windows Help / UNIX manpage format, also PDF-based documentation. However the complexity of the tool can mean a lengthy ramp-up time.
Ease of Deployment
Very easy. Bazaar has an installer for MS Windows and packages for some major Linux distributions, FreeBSD, and Mac OS X. The dependencies for manual installation are listed on the Bazaar website. Poor. Clearcase is very difficult to install in general. At least, setup for a new site is quite complex. Installing additional servers (eg repository servers) is less so.
Command Set
Tries to follow CVS conventions, but deviates where there is a different design. Excellent. All tools are available through the command-line. Not very compatible with CVS though.
Networking Support
Excellent. Works natively over HTTP (read-only), FTP and SFTP without having Bazaar installed at the remote end. Works over HTTP, SSH and a custom protocol when talking to a remote Bazaar server. Supports RSYNC and WebDAV (experimental) through plugins. Poor. Uses an *extremely* chatty RPC protocol for most clearcase operations, plus NFS or SMB for accessing the files themselves. Typically servers should be deployed locally (ie on the same LAN) as the client workstations for acceptable performance.
Portability
Works on MS Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, FreeBSD, UNIX, and basically on any system that has a recent Python port. With case-insensitive file systems there are some issues that can be avoided by using a graphical frontend. On MS Windows there is a plugin to support tracking of symlinks even if they are not supported natively by the file system. Medium. Available on Windows, and several selected flavours of UNIX (not including MacOS X, or any other Linux other than Red Hat).
Web Interface
Yes, several: Loggerhead, Webserve, Bzrweb, and Trac. Yes. Web views are supported.
Availability of Graphical User-Interfaces.
There are several graphical frontends in development, see the Bazaar Plugins page and the Third-party Tools page. Notable are QBzr (Qt) and bzr-gtk (GTK+), which can be considered beta quality. Work is also being done on integrating Bazaar with Windows Explorer, Eclipse, Nautilus, and Meld. Supplied for both Windows and UNIX. GUI tools are typically not as solid as the command-line tools though.
 


Information taken from Better SCM Initiative website by Shlomi Fish (shlomif@iglu.org.il).

Reorganized for usability by Alexey Mahotkin (Version Control Blog) in 2008.

 

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