[TriLUG] Keeping track of system changes

[Mike M]

On Wed, Sep 08, 2004 at 04:09:51PM -0400, Aaron S. Joyner wrote:
> 
> Personally, I prefer and use RCS.  It's super light-weight, really 
> straight forward, and I have a nice bash wrapper script around vim which 
> takes the tedium out of check in and check out.  

Well, CVS is descended from RCS.  CVS has a nice commit
capability built-in that uses vi/vim by default.  As an ex-RCS user I
agree that its no-overhead-get-started-now aspect is attractive.  But with a 
few canned commands, you can be up and running with CVS and you'll be using
a mainstream tool instead of a relic.

If you use RCS much, you'll soon find out about hanging lock files.
You also have to check-out and check-in for every change.  There is the
problem of changing a file before checking it out.  Then you have to
save the changed file, co the file, diff and merge with the checkout
file, then check in.  I guess you could always have your files checked
out, but there are problems with that scenario.

With CVS, you 
import at time_0.  Then you checkout your module.  As you go you simply
commit periodically - no more co-ci-co-ci etc.  CVS is a little harder
to get started but a lot easier in day-to-day use. 
-- 
Mike

Moving forward in pushing back the envelope of the corporate paradigm.