Java Reference
In-Depth Information
Enter
cvs
—the Concurrent Versioning System. It's a
versioning system
,
allowing you to retrieve copies of the source based on either date parameters
(e.g., last Tuesday) or the labels that you create. It's
concurrent
because it
supports multiple simultaneous users.
You may have used a versioning system before that let multiple program-
mers work with a set of files. Often such systems will “lock” a file while one
user is using it, keeping others from modifying it. CVS doesn't work that
way—or doesn't have to. Rather it allows users to each modify the same file
(truly concurrent), and then reconciles the changes when those changes are
made permanent.
To explain all this, it would be best to set down some terminology, as used
by CVS.
repository
The master copy of the source.
sandbox
A developer's local copy of the source.
checkout
The process of acquiring a copy of the source (one or more pieces) from
the repository.
commit
The process of adding the changes from your sandbox into the repository.
update
The process of revising your sandbox with changes that have occurred in
the repository since you last updated or created your sandbox. When you
“update” your sandbox, other developers' changes that have been commit-
ted to the repository are merged into your source sandbox.
tag
As a noun, is a special label that you create to mark a milestone in your
source repository; you can return to that milestone by checking out a copy
of the source with that tag.
tag
As a verb, refers to creating a tag in the source repository.
