[HLUG] subversion and inkscape

[Jeff Tupholme]

Hi John,

> ... and i'm under the impression that if i get subversion running on
> my pc and then i'd only have to download it once and from then i'd
> just have to update the bits that had changed, which would be a more
> efficient use of internet access than downloading the whole thing
> every time.

Correct.

> there was a bit that worried me, where it said...
> "SVN stores source code in a shared repository (in our case on
> Sourceforge's server). The repository contains all past and present
> versions of the code, and is shared by everyone."
> ... this doesn't mean that the first time i run subversion it will
> have to download "all past and present versions of the code", does it?

No, you just download the latest revision by default the first time.  
Then on subsequent downloads you get the differences between the one  
you have and the latest one at that point in time. If something is  
broken in the latest revision you can also use Subversion to go back  
to a previous revision.

The thing to watch out for when you do your initial download  
('checkout') is what part of the tree you point at. Most Subversion  
projects have trunk, branches & tags at the top level, then  
subdirectories under branches & tags. You probably just want the  
trunk, otherwise you will get a lot of extra stuff where people have  
taken snapshots of the code for historical reasons or to develop  
specialised versions.

Hope that helps.


Regards,

Jeff