<!doctype linuxdoc system> <!-- ************************** begin comment ***************************** The following is the HOW-TO for CVS/RCS source code revision system. This document is in the SGML format. You must use sgml package to process this document ************************* end of comment ***************************** --> <!-- ************************** SGML USER GUIDE ***************************** The SGML user guide on linux is located at /usr/doc/sgml-tools Read the example.sgml and guide.html documents. Usage: HTML sgml2html foo (Do not give extension .sgml here!!) Text sgml2txt foo.sgml Latex sgml2latex foo.sgml Note: Use 2 dashes - before language, error while compiling Postscript sgml2latex -language=english -o ps foo.sgml DVI sgml2latex -d foo.sgml Lyx sgml2lyx foo.sgml Richtext sgml2rtf foo.sgml gnuinfo sgml2info foo.sgml man sgml2txt -man foo.sgml SGML sgmlcheck foo.sgml ************************* end of comment ***************************** --> <article> <!-- Title information --> <title>CVS-RCS-HOWTO Document for Linux (Source Code Control System) <!-- chapt change CVS-RCS HOW-TO Concurrent Version Control System and Revision Control System (Source Code Management Tools) --> <author>Al Dev (Alavoor Vasudevan) <htmlurl url="mailto:alavoor[AT]yahoo.com" name="alavoor[AT]yahoo.com"> <date>v22.9, 28 March 2003 <abstract> This document is a "practical guide" to very quickly setup CVS/RCS source code control system. This document has custom shell scripts that are wrappers on top of CVS. These scripts provide an easy user interface for CVS. Several shell scripts are provided to make RCS easier to use. The information in this document applies to Linux and as well as to all other flavors of Unix like Solaris, HPUX, AIX, SCO, Sinix, BSD, SCO, Apple Macintosh (which is BSD unix) etc.. and BeOS. </abstract> <!-- Table of contents --> <toc> <!-- Begin the document --> <sect>Introduction <p> <bf> (The latest version of this document is at <url url="http://www.milkywaygalaxy.freeservers.com">. You may want to check there for changes). </bf> A source code control system is a MUST to manage the changes occurring to a software project during development. Developers need a complete history of changes to backtrack to previous versions in case of any problems. Since source code is the most vital component of any software project and software development takes a huge amount of time and money, it is very important to spend some time in <it><bf>safe-guarding</bf></it> the source code by using source code control systems like CVS and RCS. <p> CVS (Concurrent Version Control System) is a powerful tool which allows concurrent development of software by multiple users. It uses RCS underneath and has an application layer interface as a wrapper on top of RCS. CVS can record the history of your files (usually, but not always, source code). CVS only stores the differences between versions, instead of every version of every file you've created. CVS also keeps a log of who, when and why changes occurred, among other aspects. CVS is very helpful for managing releases and controlling the concurrent editing of source files among multiple authors. Instead of providing version control for a collection of files in a single directory, CVS provides version control for a hierarchical collection of directories consisting of revision controlled files. These directories and files can then be combined to form a software release. CVS can be used for storing "C", "C++", Java, Perl, HTML and other files. <bf>HISTORY of CVS: </bf> CVS is a very highly sophisticated and complex system. It is the <it><bf>"State of the Art"</bf></it> technology and is so called <it>"software miracle"</it>. The CVS software is a very advanced and capable system developed over a very long period of time. And it took several years to mature!! It took about 20 to 30 years of research to develop CVS algorithms and later it was coded into a software. And even today, it is still evolving!! CVS algorithms actually started in Universities several decades ago and CVS implementation started out as a bunch of shell scripts written by Dick Grune, who posted it to the newsgroup comp.sources.unix in the volume 6 release of <bf>December, 1986</bf>. While no actual code from these shell scripts is present in the current version of CVS much of the CVS conflict resolution algorithms come from them. In April, 1989, Brian Berliner designed and coded CVS. Jeff Polk later helped Brian with the design of the CVS module and vendor branch support. And today each and every major software development project in the world is written using CVS as the safe repository. As good old software hats say - <it>"You are in very safe hands, if you are using CVS !!!"</it> <sect> Which One Is for Me? CVS or RCS <p> CVS actually uses RCS underneath. CVS is a lot more powerful tool and can control a complete source code tree. It is <it><bf>very strongly</bf></it> recommended that you use CVS, because you can greatly customize CVS with scripting languages like PERL, Korn and bash shells. See the sample korn shell scripts at <ref id="Shell Scripts">. Advantages of CVS: <itemize> <item> CVS is decentralized so a user checks out files/directories from the repository and have his own separate stable source directory tree. <item> CVS can "STAMP" releases of an entire project source tree. <item> CVS can enable concurrent editing of files. <item> CVS can be greatly customized to enable strong locking of files via shell scripts or PERL scripts. CVS supports weak locking with the command 'cvs watches' and also no locking permitting concurrent editing of files. </itemize> Disadvantages of CVS: <itemize> <item> Needs a little more administration than RCS. <item> Very highly sophisticated and complex system. It is "State of the Art" technology. The cvs software is a very advanced and capable system developed over a very long period of time (it took several years!!). It took about 20 to 30 years of research to develop CVS and it is still evolving!! <item> Has a large number of commands and command options, hence a steeper learning curve for beginners. The shell scripts at <ref id="Shell Scripts"> can ease usage. </itemize> Advantages of RCS: <itemize> <item> RCS is very simple to setup, with less administrative work. <item> RCS is used in a centralized area where everyone works. <item> RCS is useful for simple systems. <item> Very strong locking of files - concurrency eliminated. </itemize> Downside of RCS: <itemize> <item> Concurrent development by multiple developers is not possible due to file locking and being limited to a single working directory. Because of the single working directory limitation, changes to files by multiple developers can cause failure of the 'make' command. <item> Cannot stamp releases of an entire software project. </itemize> This document also has shell scripts which provide simple commands to check-out, check-in, and commit files. See shell scripts at <ref id="Shell Scripts"> For RCS see the RCS mini-howto on the Linux cdrom: <CODE> cd /mnt/cdrom/Redhat/RPMS ls -l howto-6.0-*.noarch.rpm rpm -qpl howto-6* | grep -i rcs </CODE> or visit <url url="http://www.LinuxDoc.org/HOWTO/mini/RCS.html"> See also the RCS shell scripts at <ref id="rcs_scripts"> <sect> Setting up CVS <label id="Setting up CVS"> <p> First you need to install the CVS package. On Redhat Linux use: <CODE> cd /mnt/cdrom/Redhat/RPMS rpm -i rcs*.rpm rpm -i cvs*.rpm rpm -i openssh*.rpm To see the list of files installed do - rpm -qpl cvs*.rpm | less </CODE> and browse the output using j,k, CTRL+f, CTRL+D, CTRL+B, CTRL+U or using arrow keys, page up/down keys. See 'man less'. The Openssh is required if you want to use ssh (Secure Shell) with CVS. On other flavors of Unix, you may need to download the RCS and CVS tar balls and follow the README, INSTALL files to setup CVS. Visit <url url="http://www.cyclic.com"> and <url url="http://www.loria.fr/~molli/cvs-index.html"> <sect1> Environment variables <label id="CVS-Env"> <p> The following environment variables need to be setup in /etc/profile - default values required for all users. If not set in /etc/profile, then you should add these to your local profile file ~/.bash_profile. <CODE> export EDITOR=/bin/vi export CVSROOT=/home/cvsroot # WARNING!! WARNING: If you set CVSREAD to yes, checkout and update will try hard to # make the files in your working directory read-only. When this is not set, # the default behavior is to permit modification of your working files. #export CVSREAD=yes </CODE> And of course, individual users can <it>override</it> the environment variables set in /etc/profile by resetting them in their local profile file ~/.bash_profile <code> # File ~/.bash_profile # Overriding env variables by resetting export EDITOR=/usr/bin/emacs export CVSROOT=/home/someotherdir/java/cvsroot </code> Create a directory to store the source code repository and give read, write access to Unix group/user. Also make sure that the directory name of CVSROOT does not contain any blank spaces. For example CVSROOT should not be like '/home/my rootcvs'. <CODE> bash$ su - root bash# export CVSROOT=/home/cvsroot bash# groupadd --help bash# groupadd cvs bash# useradd --help bash# useradd -g cvs -d $CVSROOT cvs bash# mkdir $CVSROOT bash# ls -ld $CVSROOT ... (you should see the listing) bash# chgrp -R cvs $CVSROOT bash# chmod o-rwx $CVSROOT bash# chmod ug+rwx $CVSROOT # To initialize the CVS repository and to put in source code files # do (but requires env CVSROOT to be set) : bash# cvs init # Add the unix users to the cvs group. Create supplementary groups for users. # Note that you MUST not put any blank spaces after comma separating the # group names in -G option. # In example below user tom belongs to groups cvs, users and staff and user # johnson belongs to group cvs only. bash# usermod --help bash# usermod -G cvs some_unix_username bash# usermod -G cvs,users,staff tom bash# usermod -G cvs,users,staroffice billclinton bash# usermod -G cvs johnson bash# exit .... (logout of root superuser mode) # Login as a user and import files into cvs.... bash$ su - billclinton bash$ export EDITOR=/bin/vi bash$ export CVSROOT=/home/cvsroot # WARNING! WARNING: If you set CVSREAD to yes, checkout and update will try hard to # make the files in your working directory read-only. When this is not set, # the default behavior is to permit modification of your working files. bash$ export CVSREAD=yes # Change directory is a must (MANDATORY) bash$ cd $HOME/somedir/anotherdir/directory/my_source_code_dir # Must give vendor tag and revision tag cvs import somedir/anotherdir/directory/my_source_code_dir vendor_1_0 rev_1_0 # Also note that it is very important to give the directory tree starting # from the $HOME, that is, in above example starting from somedir. # For example I did: bash$ cd $HOME/howto/foobar bash$ cvs import howto/foobar vendor_1_0 rev_1_0 # Another example is: bash$ cd $HOME/javafilesdir bash$ cvs import javafilesdir vendor_1_0 rev_1_0 # A sample testing and verification: bash$ cd $HOME/howto/foobar bash$ cvs checkout myfoo.java </CODE> <bf>TROUBLESHOOTING:</bf> When doing checkout it says module is unknown. It is a common mistake not to change directory while doing cvs import. You <bf><it>MUST change directory</it></bf> to the source-code-directory and then do cvs import. For example: <code> bash$ cd $HOME/somedirectory/foobardir bash$ cvs import somedirectory/foobardir vendor_1_0 rev_1_0 </code> <sect1> Setup CVS on Client Box<label id="clientbox"> <p> On client boxes where you want to use the CVS, you should install cvs packages and ssh package (if you want to use ssh). Setup the environment variables: <code> bash$ export CVSROOT=":ext:developer@cvs_server_box.domain.com:/home/cvsroot" bash$ export CVS_RSH="ssh" </code> The cvs_server_box.domain.com is the IP address of the remote CVS repository server and 'developer' is the user id. Another example using pserver is given below: <code> bash$ export CVSROOT=:pserver:username@cvs.tldp.org:/cvsroot bash$ export CVS_RSH="ssh" </code> See also <ref id="multiuser">. <sect1> Migrate RCS to CVS <label id="RCS2CVS"> <p> To migrate the existing RCS files to CVS, use the following script from <ref id="downloadsoftware"> . Make sure that you installed the Korn shell package pdksh*.rpm from the Linux contrib cdrom. <bf>NOTE : <it>Get the Korn shell /bin/ksh by installing pdksh*.rpm from the Linux contrib cdrom</it></bf> Now the RCS is migrated to CVS as 'project'. You can start using the CVS commands on module 'project'. <sect> Intro to CVS Commands <label id="Intro_CVS"> <p> CVS provides a rich variety of commands (cvs_command in the Synopsis), each of which often has a wealth of options, to satisfy the many needs of source management in distributed environments. However, you don't have to master every detail to do useful work with CVS; in fact, five commands are sufficient to use (and contribute to) the source repository. The most commonly used CVS commands are: <bf>checkout</bf>, <bf>update</bf>, <bf>add</bf>, <bf>remove</bf>, <bf>commit</bf> and <bf>diff</bf>. <sect1> checkout<label id="checkout"> <p> <bf>cvs checkout modules...</bf> A necessary preliminary for most CVS work: creates your private copy of the source for modules (named collections of source; you can also use a path relative to the source repository here). You can work with this copy without interfering with others' work. At least one subdirectory level is always created. <code> bash$ cvs --help checkout Usage: cvs checkout [-ANPRcflnps] [-r rev | -D date] [-d dir] [-j rev1] [-j rev2] [-k kopt] modules... -A Reset any sticky tags/date/kopts. -N Don't shorten module paths if -d specified. -P Prune empty directories. -R Process directories recursively. -c "cat" the module database. -f Force a head revision match if tag/date not found. -l Local directory only, not recursive -n Do not run module program (if any). -p Check out files to standard output (avoids stickiness). -s Like -c, but include module status. -r rev Check out revision or tag. (implies -P) (is sticky) -D date Check out revisions as of date. (implies -P) (is sticky) -d dir Check out into dir instead of module name. -k kopt Use RCS kopt -k option on checkout. -j rev Merge in changes made between current revision and rev. (Specify the --help global option for a list of other help options) </code> <p> <sect1>Staying in sync with other developers - 'cvs update'<label id="update"> <p> <bf>cvs update</bf> Execute this command from within your private source directory when you wish to update your copies of source files from changes that other developers have made to the source in the repository. <code> bash$ cvs --help update Usage: cvs update [-APdflRp] [-k kopt] [-r rev|-D date] [-j rev] [-I ign] [-W spec] [files...] -A Reset any sticky tags/date/kopts. -P Prune empty directories. -d Build directories, like checkout does. -f Force a head revision match if tag/date not found. -l Local directory only, no recursion. -R Process directories recursively. -p Send updates to standard output (avoids stickiness). -k kopt Use RCS kopt -k option on checkout. -r rev Update using specified revision/tag (is sticky). -D date Set date to update from (is sticky). -j rev Merge in changes made between current revision and rev. -I ign More files to ignore (! to reset). -W spec Wrappers specification line. (Specify the --help global option for a list of other help options) In order to receive changes from the latest commits from your peer developers, do: bash$ cvs update If another developer has done bigger changes such as adding new directories etc. do: bash$ cvs update -d </code> <sect1>add<label id="add"> <p> <bf>cvs add file...</bf> Use this command to enroll new files in CVS records of your working directory. The files will be added to the repository the next time you run `cvs commit'. Note: You should use the `cvs import' command to bootstrap new sources into the source repository. `cvs add' is only used for new files to an already checked-out module. <code> bash$ cvs --help add Usage: cvs add [-k rcs-kflag] [-m message] files... -k Use "rcs-kflag" to add the file with the specified kflag. -m Use "message" for the creation log. (Specify the --help global option for a list of other help options) To add a new file to the repository do: bash$ cvs add newFile bash$ cvs commit To add a new binary file to the repository do: bash$ cvs add -kb newBinaryFile bash$ cvs commit (-kb specifies that file is binary) To add a new directory to the repository do: bash$ cvs add newDirectory bash$ cvs commit To remove an existing file from the repository do: bash$ rm existingFile bash$ cvs remove existingFile bash$ cvs commit </code> <sect1>remove<label id="remove"> <p> <bf>cvs remove file...</bf> Use this command (after erasing any files listed) to declare that you wish to eliminate files from the repository. The removal does not affect others until you run `cvs commit'. <code> bash$ cvs --help remove Usage: cvs remove [-flR] [files...] -f Delete the file before removing it. -l Process this directory only (not recursive). -R Process directories recursively. (Specify the --help global option for a list of other help options) </code> <sect1>commit<label id="commit"> <p> <bf>cvs commit file...</bf> To check in modifications (on existing files). Use this command when you wish to ``publish'' your changes to other developers, by incorporating them in the source repository. <bf>NOTE : </bf> It's usually a very good idea to do 'cvs update' before committing changes. <code> bash$ cvs --help commit Usage: cvs commit [-nRlf] [-m msg | -F logfile] [-r rev] files... -n Do not run the module program (if any). -R Process directories recursively. -l Local directory only (not recursive). -f Force the file to be committed; disables recursion. -F file Read the log message from file. -m msg Log message. -r rev Commit to this branch or trunk revision. (Specify the --help global option for a list of other help options) </code> <sect1>diff<label id="diff"> <p> <bf>cvs diff file...</bf> Show differences between files in the working directory and source repository, or between two revisions in the source repository. (Does not change either repository or working directory.) <code> bash$ cvs --help diff Usage: cvs diff [-lNR] [rcsdiff-options] [[-r rev1 | -D date1] [-r rev2 | -D date2]] [files...] -l Local directory only, not recursive -R Process directories recursively. -D d1 Diff revision for date against working file. -D d2 Diff rev1/date1 against date2. -N include diffs for added and removed files. -r rev1 Diff revision for rev1 against working file. -r rev2 Diff rev1/date1 against rev2. --ifdef=arg Output diffs in ifdef format. (consult the documentation for your diff program for rcsdiff-options. The most popular is -c for context diffs but there are many more). (Specify the --help global option for a list of other help options) </code> <sect1>Creating Releases<label id="createrelease"> <p> Since there usually are several files with different version numbers in a project, it's a good idea to "stamp" the files with a release tag for each release, this can be done like this (for version "v001"): <code> bash$ cvs tag -R "v001" bash$ cvs commit This release can be checked out with bash$ cvs checkout -r "v001" YourProject </code> <sect1> Emacs Editor <label id="Emacs"> <p> Emacs is a powerful editor and it supports CVS/RCS - especially for revision merging and comparing. The main Emacs site is at <url url="http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/emacs.html">. <sect> Strong, Weak or No Locking <label id="locking"> <p> CVS is a powerful system and is highly customizable. CVS supports: <itemize> <item> Strong locking with "reserved checkouts" via <bf>cvs admin -l</bf> or <ref id="Shell Scripts">. Also read the <url name="Reserved checkouts" url="http://www.cvshome.org/docs/inforeserve.html">. Here is a patch (<url url="http://www.cvshome.org/dev/patches/editf">) from Eric Griswold for reserved checkouts. <p> <item> Weak locking via 'cvs watch' features. Also see "cvs edit" to give a warning(<url url="http://www.cvshome.org/dev/text2/res2">) if someone else is already editing the file. <p> <item> No locking - the default permitting concurrent editing of files. </itemize> <sect> Shell Scripts <label id="Shell Scripts"> <p> The following are wrappers around the basic CVS commands. These scripts give you initial <bf>booster-push</bf> into the CVS system and are useful until you become very familiar with the CVS commands. The scripts are written for Korn shell since it is always available on all flavors of Unix, but you can translate to bash or Perl if needed. You can customize these scripts to your taste. They are basically CVS commands, but features are added to make it site specific. For example, the sedit script provides locking so that users will know someone is editing the file. Of course users can directly use the CVS commands to bypass these scripts. These scripts demonstrate how CVS can be <bf>customized</bf> to a great extent. <bf>NOTE: </bf> <it>The wrapper shell scripts assume the user's home directory as the root and check out the tree from CVS to build the tree underneath user's home directory. </it> <bf> TIP: </bf> <it>In these shell scripts, every target filename is composed of 3 parts - Home directory, sub-directory and the filename. The full-path is $HOME/$subdir/$fname And in CVS the same directory structure is maintained (by variable $subdir) therefore in cvs there will be something like $CVSROOT/$subdir/$fname. In all scripts, these 4 variables $HOME, $CVSROOT, $subdir and $fname play an important role. For example, sample values can be like HOME=/home/aldev, subdir=myproject/src, CVSROOT=/home/cvsroot, and fname=foo.cpp </it> Copy these scripts to /usr/local/bin and this should be in the user's PATH environment. <enum> <item> <bf>sget</bf> [-r revision_number] <file/directory name> To get a file or entire directory from CVS in READ ONLY mode. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <item> <bf>sedit</bf> [-r revision_number] <filename> To edit a file in order to make changes to code. This will lock the file so that nobody else can check it out. Of course you can change the script to your requirement - make no locking, warning message, or very strong locking. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <item> <bf>scommit</bf> [-r revision_number] <filename> To commit the changes you made to filename or entire directory. Upload your changes to CVS. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <item> <bf>supdate</bf> <filename/directory> To update a filename or to update an entire directory by getting the latest files from CVS. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <item> <bf>sunlock</bf> [-r revision_number] <filename> To unlock the file got by sedit. Will release the lock. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <item> <bf>slist</bf> To see the list of files currently being edited by you. Does 'ls -l | grep | ...' command. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. Note that there is also another Unix command by the name slist (list available Netware servers). You should make sure cvs script slist comes before other in your PATH environment. <item> <bf>sinfo</bf> <filename/directory> To get the information of changes/revisions to a file. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <item> <bf>slog</bf> <filename> To get the history of changes/revisions to a file from CVS. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <item> <bf>sdif</bf> <filename> <p><bf>sdif</bf> -r rev1 -r rev2 <filename> To get the diff of your file with CVS. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. NOTE: sdif has only one 'f' because there is already another Unix command called 'sdiff' <item> <bf>sadd</bf> <filename> To add a new file to CVS repository. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <item> <bf>sdelete</bf> <filename> To delete a file from CVS repository. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <item> <bf>sfreeze</bf> <revision name> <directory name> To freeze the code, that is make a release of the entire source tree. Click <ref id="downloadsoftware"> to get this. <p> For example : <code> cd $HOME; sfreeze REVISION_1_0 srctree </code> This will freeze code with tag REVISION_1_0 so that you can later checkout the entire tree by using the revision name. </enum> <p> <sect> CVS Documentation <label id="CVS Documentation"> <p> At Unix prompt type: <enum> <item> cvs --help <item> cvs --help-options <item> cvs --help-commands <item> cvs -H checkout <item> cvs -H commit <item> man cvs <item> man tkcvs <item> Visit <url url="http://www.cyclic.com"> <item> Visit <url url="http://www.loria.fr/~molli/cvs-index.html"> </enum> The tkcvs <url url="http://www.tkcvs.org"> is the Tcl/Tk GUI interface to CVS. It also has online help. Try the following: <itemize> <item> cd $HOME/src/foo.cpp <item> tkcvs <item> Click on foo.cpp <item> Click on 'Revision Log Icon' which is located next to 'spectacle' icon. <item> This will display the branch TREE in the window. Now click the RIGHT Mouse button on the text '1.3' and click the LEFT Mouse button on text '1.1'. Then click on "Diff" button. This will display a two-pane window!! <item> Click on the "Next" button to step thru more diffs. Click on "Center" to center the text. </itemize> There is also a Windows 95 client for CVS called WinCVS (see: <url url="http://www.wincvs.org"> and <url name="cyclicsite" url="http://www.cvshome.org/cyclic/cvs/soft-maccvs.html">). WinCVS can be used along with Samba(on cdrom samba*.rpm) - <url url="http://www.samba.org"> The essential command are: <itemize> <item> cvs checkout <filename > <item> cvs update <filename> <item> cvs add <file, ..> <item> cvs remove <file, ..> <item> cvs commit <file> <item> cvs status <filename> <item> cvs log <filename> <item> cvs diff -r1.4 -r1.5 <filename> This gives a diff between version 1.4 and 1.5 on filename. </itemize> <sect1> Online Documentation <label id="onlinedocs"> <p> On Linux systems, you can find the CVS documentation in postscript format at <bf>/usr/doc/cvs*/*.ps</bf>. Also there is an FAQ and other useful information. <code> bash# cd /usr/doc/cvs* bash# gv cvs.ps </code> <sect1> CVS Org Documentation <label id="cederquist"> <p> The documentation on CVS from "CVS Organization" is at <url url="http://www.cvshome.org/docs"> The Official manual for CVS by Cederqvist is at <url url="http://www.cvshome.org/docs/manual/cvs.html"> FAQ for CVS is at <url url="http://www.cs.utah.edu/dept/old/texinfo/cvs/FAQ.txt"> <sect1> CVS Training <label id="training"> <p> <itemize> <item> <url url="http://rpmfind.net/tools/CVS/training/cvstrain.html"> <item> <url url="http://www.loria.fr/~molli/cvs/cvs-tut/cvs_tutorial_toc.html"> <item> <url url="http://atlas.web.cern.ch/Atlas/GROUPS/SOFTWARE/OO/tools/srt/"> <item> <url url="http://durak.org/cvswebsites/"> <item> <url url="http://www-users.informatik.rwth-aachen.de/~wge/tools/cvs/cvsclient/cvsclient_toc.html"> <item> <url url="http://www-users.informatik.rwth-aachen.de/~wge/tools/cvs.html"> <p> General utilities for cvs (third party): <item> The textbook "Open Source Development with CVS" by Karl Fogel at <url url="http://cvsbook.red-bean.com"> has <url name="third-party-tools" url="http://cvsbook.red-bean.com/cvsbook.html#Third-Party_Tools"> and mirror sites at <url name="Zevils" url="http://www.zevils.com/doc/cvsbook/cvsbook_8.html"> <item> <url url="http://rcs.ee.washington.edu/spp/Projects/Manastash/Links/cvsbook_toc.html"> </itemize> <sect1> CVS Online Textbook <label id="textbook"> <p> The following CVS textbook is available online. <enum> <item> <bf>"CVS Best Practices" </bf> Version: 0.5 by Vivek Venugopalan, <htmlurl url="mailto:vivek@magic-cauldron.com" name="vivek@magic-cauldron.com"> at <url url="http://www.tldp.org/REF/CVS-BestPractices/html/index.html"> <p> <item> Open Source Development with CVS by Karl Fogel <url url="http://cvsbook.red-bean.com"> <p> <item> The Official manual for CVS by Cederqvist is at <url url="http://www.cvshome.org/docs/manual/cvs.html"> </enum> <sect> Graphical Front Ends <label id="frontend"> <p> The following GUI front ends for CVS are available: <itemize> <item> Popular CVS GUI front end <url url="http://cervisia.sourceforge.net">, get RPM packages at <url name="Cervisia RPMs" url="http://rpmfind.net/linux/rpm2html/search.php?query=cervisia"> <item> CVS home.org <url url="http://www.cvshome.org/dev/addons.html"> <item> CVS Web for windows <url url="http://www.devguy.com/fp/cfgmgmt/cvs/cvs_admin_nt.htm#CVSWEBIIS"> and at <url url="http://stud.fh-heilbronn.de/~zeller/cgi/cvsweb.cgi"> <item> TkCVS <url url="http://www.tkcvs.org"> is the Tcl/Tk GUI interface to CVS and at <url name="cyclicsite" url="http://www.cvshome.org/cyclic/tkcvs/index.html"> <item> gCVS: A portable GUI for the non-technical CVS user <url url="http://www.arachne.org/software/gcvs"> <item> jCVS is a CVS client package written entirely in Java <url url="http://www.jcvs.org"> And at <url name="cyclicsite" url="http://www.cvshome.org/cyclic/jcvs/index.html"> <item> WinCVS <url url="http://www.cvshome.org/cyclic/cvs/soft-maccvs.html"> and at <url name="cyclicsite" url="http://www.cvshome.org/cyclic/cvs/soft-maccvs.html"> <item> Component soft Win CVS <url url="http://www.componentsoftware.com/cvs"> <item> JA-SIG UPortal CVS <url url="http://www.mis3.udel.edu/~jlaker/development"> <item> <url url="http://ppprs1.phy.tu-dresden.de/~trogisch/lincvs/lincvsen.html"> <item> <url url="http://www.loria.fr/~molli/cvs/doc/cvs_toc.html"> </itemize> It is <bf>very strongly recommended</bf> that you use <url name="Samba(on cdrom samba*.rpm)" url="http://www.samba.org"> and a <ref id="win95" name="PC X Server"> on MS Windows 95/NT. By using Samba the remote directory on Unix will look like local folder on MS Windows. See the next section for <ref id="win95" name="PC X Server">. <bf>For Apple Macintosh - Mac OS:</bf> See MacCvs at <url url="http://www.cvsgui.org"> and MacCvsPro at <url url="http://www.maccvs.org"> <sect> CVS for MS Windows 95/98/NT/2000/XP <label id="win95"> <p> <sect1> Method 1: Using VNC, Samba <label id="cvsexe"> <p> It is <bf>VERY STRONGLY recommended</bf> that you use <url name="Samba(on cdrom samba*.rpm)" url="http://www.samba.org"> and a VNC viewer (or PC X Server) on MS Windows 95/NT. With samba the Unix/Linux CVS server will be like a <bf>file server</bf>. By using Samba the remote directory on Unix will look like a local folder on MS Windows on the local disk. Install samba*.rpm on Unix/Linux server(which has the CVS repository) and install the VNC viewer (or PC X server) on MS Windows 95/NT/2000/XP desktop. Using a VNC (or PC X server) you can easily log on to the Unix box and check-out/check-in the files. And you can use tools like Java Visual Cafe or Java JBuilder on MS Windows to edit the files located in Unix/Linux folder(via samba). After editing, you can check-in the files to Unix through VNC or PC X-server. Advantages of using CVS on Linux/Unix via MS Windows are: <itemize> <item> Only one single Linux File server (CVS server) can serve many MS Windows clients. <item> A Linux file server (CVS) is very robust, secure and reliable <item> Only one UPS (uninterrupted power supply) battery is required for a linux server. <item> Linux can serve as MS Windows folder through Samba package. <item> A Linux file server (CVS) supports centralized backups via tools like <url name="BRS, Arkeia, Bru" url="http://www.milkywaygalaxy.freeservers.com"> mirrors at <url name="angelfire" url="http://www.angelfire.com/country/aldev0">, <url name="geocities" url="http://www.geocities.com/alavoor/index.html">, <url name="virtualave" url="http://aldev0.virtualave.net">, <url name="Fortunecity" url="http://members.fortunecity.com/aldev">, <url name="Freewebsites" url="http://aldev.freewebsites.com">, <url name="Tripod" url="http://members.tripod.lycos.com/aldev">, <url name="101xs" url="http://www.101xs.com/101xs/aldev">, <url name="50megs" url="http://aldev0.50megs.com">, <item> A Linux file server (CVS) requires just one small server room which can air-conditioned and dust free. Small room keeps the cooling/heating costs down. <item> A Linux file server (CVS) provides security via Unix groups and user id authentication </itemize> The best tool for remote access is VNC. The VNC is lightweight and is much better than the PC X servers. <bf><it>The VNC is very strongly recommended over PC X server</it></bf>. The remote access methods available are: <itemize> <item>VNC (Virtual Network Computing) at <url url="http://www.uk.research.att.com/vnc"> VNC is not an X-server but can display the remote Unix on Windows. VNC is the best tool in the market for remote access, it is very lightweight and is a very powerful software. <p> <item> Get VNC rpms from <url name="rpmfind" url="http://rpmfind.net/linux/rpm2html/search.php?query=vnc">. <p> <item> The best Window manager for VNC is QVWM which is like MS Windows 98/NT/2000/XP interface, get it from <url url="http://www.qvwm.org">. <p> <item> After starting vncserver, you can start the <bf>vncviewer</bf> program on clients like MS Windows, Mac or Linux. <p> <item> See also the <url name="List of X11 Windows Managers" url="http://www.dlhoffman.com/publiclibrary/RPM/X11_Window_Managers.html">. </itemize> <bf>Compiling qvwm on Solaris : </bf> On Solaris you should install the following packages which you can get from <url url="http://sun.freeware.com"> - xpm, imlib, jpeg, libungif, giflib, libpng, tiff. And you can download the binary package for solaris from <url url="http://www.qvwm.org">. Or you can download the qvwm source for solaris from <url url="http://www.qvwm.org"> and compile it using gcc. Troubleshooting compile: You should put unsigned long before arg in usleep() usleep((unsigned long) 10000) The following PC X servers are available: <itemize> <item> Low cost, best and small size (3 MB) <url url="http://www.microimages.com"> and click on "X-Server (MI/X) for Windows" <item> Humming bird eXceed 14 MB <url url="http://www.hummingbird.com"> <item> Starnet 5.2 MB<url url="http://www.starnet.com"> <p> There are more than 2 dozen vendors for X servers for Windows: <item> X-win pro 6.34 MB <url url="http://www.labf.com"> <item> X-WinPro <url url="http://lab-pro.com"> <item> X-Link <url url="http://www.xlink.com/x.htm"> <item> Xoftware <url url="http://www.age.com"> <p> University resources: <item> University listings <url url="http://www.et.byu.edu/support/pc/xterm.html"> <item> Floppy based PC "X server" <url url="http://mirriwinni.cse.rmit.edu.au/~brad/co338/sem1/floppy.html"> </itemize> <sect1> Method 2: Using Cygwin <label id="cvsexe"> <p> You can install the <url name="Redhat Cygwin" url="http://www.cygwin.com"> and install the CVS clients and SSH packages via Cygwin. With cygwin the Windows 95/NT/2000/XP will be like a Unix client. Bring up the cygwin bash shell prompt and you can access the remote CVS server. With cygwin the Windows 95/NT will be like any other Linux CVS client. <sect1> CVS exe for Windows 95/NT/2000/XP <label id="cvsexe"> <p> You can install and run CVS on MS Windows directly. Download cvsnt from <url url="http://www.cvsnt.org">. See the installation instructions and other documents of CVS on NT/2000 at <url url="http://www.devguy.com/fp/cfgmgmt/cvs/cvs_admin_nt.htm#install">. <sect1> Windows 95/NT/2000/XP FTP Tools<label id="ftptools"> <p> You can also use the ftp tools on MS Windows to transfer files from a Unix/Linux (CVS repository) to windows: <itemize> <item> Go to Tucows and search "ftp tools" for MS Windows <url url="http://www.tucows.com"> </itemize> <sect1> Visual Cafe(Java), JBuilder, MS Visual C++, HTML files <label id="mstools"> <p> Using Samba and a PC X server it is possible to use CVS on MS Windows platform. And the tools like Symantec Visual Cafe (Java), Inprise JBuilder, MS Visual C++ and others are easily supported by CVS. You can also store the HTML files on a CVS repository via Samba and easily access them from MS Windows. <sect1> Samba Admin tool <label id="samba"> <p> To administer samba use the admin tools from <url url="http://www.samba.org">. Go here and click on "GUI Interfaces Tools". <sect> Security of CVS Repository <label id="cvssecurity"> <p> To make a CVS server and CVS repository secure do the following: <itemize> <item> Run CVS on a stand-alone Linux/Unix box, see <ref id="perftuning" name="Performance Tuning">. <item> Remove unnecessary software packages from CVS linux box - to prevent external vandals running it. Just in case vandals break into the system, you do not want to give them a chance to run dangerous programs. <item> Consider SSH as given in the chapter <ref id="multiuser" name="Multi-User Repository"> <item> Consider Kerberos - install cvs-*-kerberos*.rpm package <url url="http://cvshome.org/dev/codelinux.html">. <item> Visit <url url="http://www.cvshome.org"> and post your security questions in the <url name="mailing list" url="http://cvshome.org/communication.html">. </itemize> <sect> Remote, Multi-User CVS Repository <label id="multiuser"> <p> The Cederqvist manual at <url url="http://cvshome.org/docs/manual/cvs_2.html#SEC30"> describes how to setup CVS for external access. In order to use CVS for a group, one has to set up a permissions system to allow people to access the system from other machines. There are three ways to do this (:server:, :pserver:, and :ext:). The pserver mechanism and use of rsh are both insecure. Only the :ext: (with ssh) offers sufficient security protection. If you set CVS_RSH to SSH or some other rsh replacement, the instructions <bf>may be</bf> similar to `.rhosts' but consult the documentation for your rsh replacement. To get ssh visit <url url="http://rpmfind.net"> and in the search box enter "ssh". Or visit <url url="http://www.redhat.com/apps/download"> and in the search box enter "ssh". Download and install the ssh RPM and then configure CVS to use it. See also <url url="http://www.ssh.org">. Note: If you plan to configure CVS for use with rsh then you MUST do this critical step: <code> bash# chmod 600 .rhosts </code> See also JA-SIG UPortal CVS repository <url url="http://www.mis3.udel.edu/~jlaker/development">. <sect1> SSH Authentication <label id="sshauth"> <p> If you're tired of entering passwords for each simple CVS command, then you can distribute your ssh-identity from the client to the server in order to allow automatic identification (i.e. no password needed!), this can be done by On the CVS server box do: <code> For ssh 1: bash$ cd $HOME bash$ ssh-keygen For ssh 2: bash$ cd $HOME bash$ ssh-keygen -t rsa </code> You should be asked to save 'your identification' in /home/developer/.ssh/identity (ssh 1) or /home/developer/.ssh/id_rsa.pub (ssh 2) (or wherever $HOME points to), just hit enter. When asked for password and confirmation of password, continue hitting enter. Then copy your public key (identity.pub for ssh 1 or id_rsa.pub for ssh 2) to the server using secure copy (a part of ssh): <code> ssh 1: clientbox$ scp .ssh/identity.pub developer@serverbox.domain.com:~/.ssh ssh 2: clientbox$ scp .ssh/id_rsa.pub developer@serverbox.domain.com:~/.ssh </code> Then log onto the server and fix the authorized_keys file. <code> ssh 1: clientbox$ ssh developer@serverbox.domain.com serverbox$ cd .ssh serverbox$ cat identity.pub >> authorized_keys ssh 2: clientbox$ ssh developer@serverbox.domain.com serverbox$ cd .ssh serverbox$ cat id_rsa.pub >> authorized_keys2 serverbox$ chmod go-w authorized_keys2 </code> You should now be able to ssh directly from the client to server without having to enter password, this can be tested with: <code> ssh 1 or ssh 2: clientbox$ ssh developer@serverbox.domain.com </code> Version control from this point should not require you to enter the password. Note: This enables anyone getting access to your client to continue into the server without knowing the password on the server. Encrypted Disks If you fear such a situation, this can (somewhat) be prevented by using a encrypted disk, e.g. PGPDisk holding the $HOME directory on the client. So when an intruder takes over your machine s/he needs to know the password for your encrypted disk in order to get further into the server. Another advantage of using a encrypted disk is that your (checked out) source code can reside on it. <sect1> Securing CVS by pserver Port Forwarding using an SSH Tunnel <label id="sshtunnel"> <p> From : <url url="http://www.cycom.co.uk/howto/cvssshtunnel.html"> The Concurrent Versions System, in its "pserver" client/server mode, and secured by "ssh" encrypted tunnels, can allow multiple authors to safely collaborate over the internet. CVS is a source file version control system optimised for wide area networks, concurrent editing, and reuse of 3rd party source libraries. Pserver is a protocol used for communication between CVS clients and servers. SSH is a tool to transparently encrypt TCP/IP network connections. MSWindows users can use a posix shell The tools discussed here are most functional in a unix environment but windows users can obtain similar functions by using a posix shell available from http://www.cygwin.com/. which will include an openssh package in 'latest' and a cvs package in 'contrib'. Other native windows ports of the tools are available but may lack needed features such as SSH2 DSA support. Creating the CVS Repository on the repository server machine If you are a contributing author, you don't need to know how the repository was created. You may skip this section. If you are the unix repository administrator, you would create a directory and run cvs init then adjust the control files in CVSROOT to suit the permitted users (writers, passwd). It is convenient to have all files owned by "cvsuser" Starting the repository service If you are a contributing author, you don't need to know how the repository server is started. You may skip this section. If you are the unix repository administrator, you allow the server to be started by xinetd with security constraints that specify that only clients local to the server machine may connect. To do this, create a configuration file named "/etc/xinetd.d/cvspserver" with contents similar to: <code> service cvspserver { flags = REUSE socket_type = stream wait = no user = cvsuser server = /usr/bin/cvs server_args = -f --allow-root=/cycomcvs pserver passenv = log_on_failure += USERID only_from = 127.0.0.1 bind = 127.0.0.1 } </code> then restart the xinetd super-service. Generating a public/private DSA keypair on the author's client machine Contributing authors must perform this step only once. The "ssh" tools have various ways of authenticating users. The method chosen here is to use the DSA Digital Signature Algorithm. This is a public/private keypair algorithm which means that the secret private key need never be communicated to anyone and can stay safe on the clients hard disk (protected by a passphrase). The public key can be advertised to anyone with no loss of security. If you do not already have the ssh tools then you should obtain them from http://www.openssh.com/. They must support SSH2 as we use the DSA algorithm not RSA. A unix client will generate the keypair using:- ssh-keygen -d This will result in the creation of a file "~/.ssh/id_dsa.pub". You must send this public file to the unix repository administrator. Do not send any other file nor reveal any passphrase. Authorizing a client to tunnel to the repository server machine If you are a contributing author, you don't need to know how authorization is allowed. You may skip this section. If you are the unix repository administrator, on receipt of a clients "id_dsa.pub" file, append the single line therein to the "~cvsnobody/.ssh/authorized_keys2" file on the server. Creating the secure tunnel between author's client machine and the repository server machine. CVS keeps a single copy of the master sources called a source repository. Remote authors access the repository using CVS client programs which talk to the repository service using a "pserver" protocol and connect using a registered TCP/IP port (port 2401). The pserver protocol is insecure because passwords are transmitted unencrypted and there are often some hacked hosts on a network that are sniffing for passwords. The connection to be used for the pserver protocol therefore needs to be encrypted where it passes over any network. The "ssh" suite of programs provides such encrypted connections. SSH will create a secure tunnel which makes the repository service appear to be local to your client machine. Similarly, your client machine will appear to be local to the repository service. Both client and server are fooled into thinking that they are on the same machine and that no traffic travels over any network. The single line unix command to achieve this is:- /usr/bin/ssh -v -a -e none -N -o 'KeepAlive=yes' -o 'BatchMode=yes' -L 2401:localhost:2401 cvsnobody@j2ee.cycom.co.uk The fixed cvsnobody user is just for ssh tunneling purposes; it is not relevant to CVS. The j2ee.cycom.co.uk is the repository server machine name. This command will block. To destroy the tunnel, cntrl-c the command. If the tunnel collapses in use, reestablish it by repeating the command. Use another window to operate the CVS clients. Operating CVS clients on the author's client machine Having established a tunnel, the remote CVS repository service now appears to be local to your client machine (i.e. at localhost). The CVS client programs obtain configuration data from a CVSROOT environment variable which should be set in unix (e.g in your ".bash_profile") using:- <code> CVSROOT=':pserver:jsharp@localhost:/cycomcvs' export CVSROOT </code> The username "jsharp" and the repository root "/cycomcvs" will have been sent to you by the repository administrator. The first CVS client command should always be:- cvs login You will be prompted for a password (again sent to you by the repository administrator). To create a new cvs working directory and populate it from Honest John Car Rental Demo sources, use :- <code> mkdir mywork cd mywork cvs co hjvh cvs co hjvhear cvs co hjvhmodel </code> To freshen an existing working directory with updates from other authors, use:- <code> cd mywork/hjvh cvs update </code> To publish the files that you have changed in an existing working directory, use:- <code> cd mywork/hjvh cvs commit </code> To publish a newly created file in an existing working directory, use:- <code> cd mywork/hjvh cd mywork/hjvh cvs add mynewfile.txt cvs commit </code> To import a new independent directory tree of sources into the repository, make sure all files in the tree are useful source and then use:- <code> cd projdir cvs import projdir projV1_1 proj_V1_1 cd .. mv projdir origprojsources cvs co projdir </code> <sect1> An Example - Access Remote CVS Server <label id="remoteeg"> <p> To access a remote cvs server, here is an example: <code> # Set env variable export EDITOR=/bin/vi export CVSROOT=:pserver:yourname@cvs.tldp.org:/cvsroot # Login to remote cvs server cvs -d $CVSROOT login # Goto some local directory cd $HOME/<somedirectory> # You MUST create a new directory, as below... mkdir cvsroot # Create the local cvs directory which has the same name as in CVSROOT # Now get the files from remote CVS repository cd cvsroot cvs get LDP/howto # Or you can do 'cvs get . ' which will get everything # After you make changes some file and later check-in that do cd $HOME/<somedirectory>/cvsroot cvs ci -m "your update comments here" LDP/howto/somefilename.java </code> <sect> RCS Shell Scripts <label id="rcs_scripts"> <p> If you want to use RCS instead of CVS then you can use the following shell scripts. <enum> <item> cotree.sh - Will check out the entire directory tree from RCS. Instead of doing 'co -l name' on each file one-by-one, you can give just one command. Very useful shell script. <item> cofiles.sh - Will check out all the files in the directory. <item> ciall.sh - Will check in all the files into RCS with just one shell command. </enum> You can get these scripts from <ref id="downloadsoftware">. <sect> Performance Tuning of a CVS Server <label id="perftuning"> <p> For optimum performance a CVS server must be running on a stand alone Linux/Unix box. To get more bang for a given CPU processing power, do the following: <itemize> <item> Recompile the Linux kernel to make it small and lean. Remove items which are not used. See the kernel howto at <url url="http://www.linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/Kernel-HOWTO.html"> <p> <item> Turn off unneccessary Unix processes - on Linux/Unix systems run chkconfig. <code> bash$ su - root bash# man chkconfig bash# chkconfig --help bash# chkconfig --list | grep on | less From the above list, turn off the processes you do not want to start automatically - bash# chkconfig --level 0123456 <service name> off Next time when the machine is booted these services will not be started. Now, shutdown the services manually which you just turned off. bash# cd /etc/rc.d/init.d bash# ./<service name> stop </code> <p> <item> Do not run any other application processes which are unnecessary. <p> <item> Do not leave X Window running unattended because its processes consume memory and contribute to CPU load. It can also be a serious security hole from outside attacks. The X Window managers generally used are KDE, GNOME, CDE, XDM and others. You must exit the X Window immediately after using and most of the time you should see a command line console login prompt on the CVS server machine. </itemize> <sect> Problem Reporting System <label id="PRS"> <p> Along with CVS, you may want to use project tracking system or problem reporting system. Every software project needs a problem reporting system that track bugs and assigns them to various developers. See GNU gpl GNATS at <url url="http://www.gnu.org/software/gnats/gnats.html"> and <url url="http://dcl.sourceforge.net"> And commercial PRS at <url url="http://www.stonekeep.com"> look for a project tracking system. <sect> Configuration Management System Tools <label id="configmgt"> <p> <bf>What is Configuration Management (CM) ?</bf> There are a number of different interpretations. It is about the tracking and control of software development and its activities. That is, it concerns the management of software development projects with respect to issues such as multiple developers working on the same code at the same time, targeting multiple platforms, supporting multiple versions, and controlling the status of code (for example a beta test versus a real release). Even within that scope there are different schools of thought: <itemize> <item>Traditional Configuration Management - checkin/checkout control of sources (and sometimes binaries) and the ability to perform builds (or compiles) of the entities. Other functions may be included as well. <item>Process Management - control of the software development activities. For example, it might check to ensure that a change request existed and had been approved for fixing and that the associated design, documentation, and review activities have been completed before allowing the code to be "checked in" again. </itemize> While process management and control are necessary for a repeatable, optimized development process, a solid configuration management foundation for that process is essential. Visit the following links: <itemize> <item> FAQ on Configuration Management tools <url url="http://www.iac.honeywell.com/Pub/Tech/CM/CMFAQ.html"> <item>Linux version control and configuration management tools <url url="http://linas.org/linux/cmvc.html"> <item> Configuration Management systems <url url="http://www.cmtoday.com/yp/commercial.html"> <item> Configuration Management Tools <url url="http://www.iac.honeywell.com/Pub/Tech/CM/CMTools.html"> <item> DevGuy CVS config mgmt <url url="http://devguy.com/fp/cfgmgmt/cvs"> <item> <url name="Yahoo category site" url="http://dir.yahoo.com/Computers_and_Internet/software/programming_tools/software_engineering/configuration_management/cvs___concurrent_versions_system"> <item> Free config mgmt tool <url url="http://www.canb.auug.org.au/~millerp/aegis/aegis.html"> <item> Free CM tools <url url="http://www.loria.fr/cgi-bin/molli/cm/wilma/fcmt"> <item> Rational ClearCase tool <url url="http://www.rational.com/products/clearcase/prodinfo.jsp"> </itemize> <sect> Related Sites <label id="relatedsites"> <p> Related URLs are at: <itemize> <item> Linux goodies main site is at <url url="http://24.221.230.253"> and secondary site at <url url="http://www.milkywaygalaxy.freeservers.com"> Mirror sites are at - <url name="angelfire" url="http://www.angelfire.com/country/aldev0">, <url name="geocities" url="http://www.geocities.com/alavoor/index.html">, <url name="virtualave" url="http://aldev0.virtualave.net">, <url name="Fortunecity" url="http://members.fortunecity.com/aldev">, <url name="Freewebsites" url="http://aldev.freewebsites.com">, <url name="Tripod" url="http://members.tripod.lycos.com/aldev">, <url name="101xs" url="http://www.101xs.com/101xs/aldev">, <url name="50megs" url="http://aldev0.50megs.com">, <item> CVS Bubbles <url url="http://www.loria.fr/~molli/cvs-index.html"> <item> CSSC (SCCS like system) <url url="http://cssc.sourceforge.net"> and <url name="mirror-site" url="ftp://alpha.gnu.org/pub/gnu/CSSC"> <item> SCCS for Linux <url url="http://www.bitmover.com/bitkeeper"> </itemize> <sect> SCCS v/s CVS-RCS <p> SCCS (Source Code Control System) is no longer being enhanced or improved. The general consensus has been that this tool is clumsy and not suited to large numbers of users working on one project. Actually, SCCS interleaves all the versions, but it can make new development get <bf>progressively slower</bf>. Hence, SCCS is NOT recommended for new projects; however, it is still there to support old code base in SCCS. RCS (Revision Control System) is often considered to be better than SCCS. One reason for this is that RCS baselines the most recent version and keeps deltas for earlier ones, making new development faster. Additional discussions concerning SCCS vs RCS are at <url url="http://www.faqs.org/faqs/unix-faq/faq/part7"> <bf>Note that RCS learned from the mistakes of SCCS... </bf> CVS, which requires RCS, extends RCS to control concurrent editing of sources by several users working on releases built from a hierarchical set of directories. "RCS is [analogous to using] assembly language, while CVS is [like using] Pascal". <sect> Other Formats of this Document <p> This document is published in 14 different formats namely: DVI, Postscript, Latex, Adobe Acrobat PDF, LyX, GNU-info, HTML, RTF(Rich Text Format), Plain-text, Unix man pages, single HTML file, SGML (Linuxdoc format), SGML (Docbook format), and MS WinHelp format. This howto document is located at: <itemize> <item> <url url="http://www.linuxdoc.org"> and click on HOWTOs and search for the howto document name using CTRL+f or ALT+f within the web-browser. </itemize> You can also find this document at the following mirrors sites: <itemize> <item> <url url="http://www.caldera.com/LDP/HOWTO"> <item> <url url="http://www.linux.ucla.edu/LDP"> <item> <url url="http://www.cc.gatech.edu/linux/LDP"> <item> <url url="http://www.redhat.com/mirrors/LDP"> <item> Other mirror sites near you (network-address-wise) can be found at <url url="http://www.linuxdoc.org/mirrors.html"> select a site and go to directory /LDP/HOWTO/xxxxx-HOWTO.html </itemize> <itemize> <item> You can get this HOWTO document as a single file tar ball in HTML, DVI, Postscript or SGML formats from - <url url="ftp://www.linuxdoc.org/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/other-formats/"> and <url url="http://www.linuxdoc.org/docs.html#howto"> <p> <item>Plain text format is in: <url url="ftp://www.linuxdoc.org/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO"> and <url url="http://www.linuxdoc.org/docs.html#howto"> <p> <item>Single HTML file format is in: <url url="http://www.linuxdoc.org/docs.html#howto"> <p> A single HTML file can be created with the command (see man sgml2html) - sgml2html -split 0 xxxxhowto.sgml <p> <item>Translations to other languages like French, German, Spanish, Chinese, and Japanese are in <url url="ftp://www.linuxdoc.org/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO"> and <url url="http://www.linuxdoc.org/docs.html#howto"> Any help from you to translate to other languages is welcome. </itemize> The document is written using a tool called "SGML-Tools" which can be got from: <url url="http://www.sgmltools.org"> Compiling the source you will get the following commands like: <itemize> <item>sgml2html xxxxhowto.sgml (to generate html file) <item>sgml2html -split 0 xxxxhowto.sgml (to generate a single page html file) <item>sgml2rtf xxxxhowto.sgml (to generate RTF file) <item>sgml2latex xxxxhowto.sgml (to generate latex file) </itemize> <sect1> Acrobat PDF format <label id="acrobatpdf"> <p> A PDF file can be generated from postscript file using either acrobat <bf>distill</bf> or <bf>Ghostscript</bf>. And a postscript file is generated from DVI which in turn is generated from a LaTex file. You can download distill software from <url url="http://www.adobe.com">. Given below is a sample session: <code> bash$ man sgml2latex bash$ sgml2latex filename.sgml bash$ man dvips bash$ dvips -o filename.ps filename.dvi bash$ distill filename.ps bash$ man ghostscript bash$ man ps2pdf bash$ ps2pdf input.ps output.pdf bash$ acroread output.pdf & </code> Or you can use the Ghostscript command <bf>ps2pdf</bf>. ps2pdf is a work-alike for nearly all the functionality of Adobe's Acrobat Distiller product: it converts PostScript files to Portable Document Format (PDF) files. <bf>ps2pdf</bf> is implemented as a very small command script (batch file) that invokes Ghostscript, selecting a special "output device" called <bf>pdfwrite</bf>. In order to use ps2pdf, the pdfwrite device must be included in the makefile when Ghostscript was compiled; see the documentation on building Ghostscript for details. <sect1> Convert Linuxdoc to Docbook format <label id="linuxdoc2docbook"> <p> This document is written in linuxdoc SGML format. The Docbook SGML format supercedes the linuxdoc format and has a lot more features than linuxdoc. The linuxdoc is very simple and easy to use. To convert linuxdoc SGML file to Docbook SGML use the program <bf>ld2db.sh</bf> and some Perl scripts. The ld2db output is not 100% clean and you need to use the <bf>clean_ld2db.pl</bf> Perl script. You may need to manually correct a few lines in the document. <itemize> <item> Download the ld2db program from <url url="http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/~rrt/docbook.html"> or from <url name="Milkyway Galaxy site" url="http://www.milkywaygalaxy.freeservers.com"> click on "Source code for C++ howto". <item> Download the cleanup_ld2db.pl perl script from from <url name="Milkyway Galaxy site" url="http://www.milkywaygalaxy.freeservers.com"> click on "Source code for C++ howto". </itemize> The ld2db.sh is not 100% clean, so you will get some errors when you run it. <code> bash$ ld2db.sh file-linuxdoc.sgml db.sgml bash$ cleanup.pl db.sgml > db_clean.sgml bash$ gvim db_clean.sgml bash$ docbook2html db.sgml </code> And you may have to manually edit some of the minor errors after running the Perl script. For example you may need to put closing tag < /Para> for each < Listitem> <sect1> Convert to MS WinHelp format <label id="mswinhelp"> <p> You can convert the SGML howto document to a Microsoft Windows Help file, First convert the sgml to html using: <code> bash$ sgml2html xxxxhowto.sgml (to generate html file) bash$ sgml2html -split 0 xxxxhowto.sgml (to generate a single page html file) </code> Then use the tool <url name="HtmlToHlp" url="http://javadocs.planetmirror.com/htmltohlpe.html">. You can also use sgml2rtf and then use the RTF files for generating winhelp files. <sect1> Reading various formats <label id="readformats"> <p> In order to view the document in dvi format, use the xdvi program. The xdvi program is located in tetex-xdvi*.rpm package in Redhat Linux which can be located through ControlPanel | Applications | Publishing | TeX menu buttons. To read a dvi document give the command: <tscreen><verb> xdvi -geometry 80x90 howto.dvi man xdvi </verb></tscreen> And resize the window with the mouse. To navigate use Arrow keys, Page Up, Page Down keys, also you can use 'f', 'd', 'u', 'c', 'l', 'r', 'p', 'n' letter keys to move up, down, center, next page, previous page etc. To turn off expert menu press 'x'. You can read a postscript file using the program 'gv' (ghostview) or 'ghostscript'. The ghostscript program is in the ghostscript*.rpm package and the gv program is in the gv*.rpm package in Redhat Linux which can be located through ControlPanel | Applications | Graphics menu buttons. The gv program is much more user friendly than ghostscript. Also ghostscript and gv are available on other platforms like OS/2, Windows 95 and NT. You can view this document even on those platforms. <itemize> <item>Get ghostscript for Windows 95, OS/2, and for all OSes from <url url="http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost"> </itemize> To read a postscript document give the command: <tscreen><verb> gv howto.ps ghostscript howto.ps </verb></tscreen> You can read an HTML format document using Netscape Navigator, Microsoft Internet explorer, Redhat Baron Web browser or any of the 10 other web browsers. You can read the latex, LyX output using LyX an X Window front end to LaTex. <sect> CVS Shell Scripts <label id="downloadsoftware"> <p> You can get the shell scripts for a nominal fee (which covers code maintenance and ISP charges) from <url name="Milkyway Galaxy site" url="http://www.milkywaygalaxy.freeservers.com">. These shell scripts are very useful. <sect> Copyright and License <p> Copyright Al Dev (Alavoor Vasudevan) 1998-2002. License is GNU GPL, but it is requested that you retain the author's name and email on all copies. </article>