Comparison between Subversion

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SCM feature: Subversion Add to comparison: +CVS
+AccuRev
+Aegis
+AllChange
+Arch
+Bazaar
+BitKeeper
+ClearCase
+CM+
+CMSynergy
+Co-Op
+Darcs
+Git
+LibreSource Synchronizer
+Mercurial
+Monotone
+OpenCM
+Perforce
+PureCM
+SourceAnywhere
+Superversion
+Surround SCM
+svk
+Team Foundation Server
+Vesta
+Visual SourceSafe
Atomic Commits
Commits are atomic.
Files and Directories Moves or Renames
Yes. Renames are supported.
Intelligent Merging after Moves or Renames
No. "svn help me" says "Note: this subcommand is equivalent to a 'copy' and 'delete'." There's a bug report about it.
File and Directories Copies
Yes. And it's a very cheap operation (O(1)) that is also utilized for branching.
Remote Repository Replication
Indirectly, by using Chia-liang Kao's SVN::Mirror add-on or Shlomi Fish' SVN-Pusher utility.
Propagating Changes to Parent Repositories
Yes, using either Chia-Ling Kao's SVN::Mirror script or the svn-push utility by Shlomi Fish.
Repository Permissions
Yes. The WebDAV-based service supports defining HTTP permissions for various directories of the repository.
Changesets' Support
Partial support. There are implicit changeset that are generated on each commit.
Tracking Line-wise File History
Yes. (svn blame)
Ability to Work only on One Directory of the Repository
Yes.
Tracking Uncommited Changes
Yes. Using svn diff
Per-File Commit Messages
No. There is no such feature.
Documentation
Very good. There is a free online book and some online tutorials and resources. The book is written in DocBook/XML and so is convertible to many different formats. The command-line client also provides a good online help system that can be used as a reference.
Ease of Deployment
A Subversion service requires installing an Apache 2 module (if one wishes to use HTTP as the underlying protocol) or its own proprietary server. The client requires only the Subversion-specific logic and the Neon WebDAV library (for HTTP). Installation of the components is quite straightforward, but will require some work, assuming Subversion does not come prepackaged for one's system.
Command Set
A CVS-like command set which is easy to get used to for CVS-users.
Networking Support
Very good. The Subversion service can use either WebDAV+DeltaV (which is HTTP or HTTPS based) as its underylying protocol, or its own proprietary protocol that can be channeled over an SSH connection.
Portability
Excellent. Clients and Servers work on UNIX, Windows and Mac OS X.
Web Interface
Yes. ViewVC, SVN::Web, WebSVN, ViewSVN, mod_svn_view, Chora, Trac, SVN::RaWeb::Light, SVN Browser, Insurrection and perl_svn. Aside from that, the Subversion Apache service provides a rudimentary web-interface.
Availability of Graphical User-Interfaces.
Very good. There are many available GUIs: RapidSVN (cross-platform), TortoiseSVN (Windows Explorer plug-in), Jsvn (Java), etc. Most of them are still under development.
 


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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