Pragmatic Version Control using CVS (Pragmatic Bookshelf)

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Dave Thomas @pragdave and Andy Hunt

Pragmatic Version Control using CVS

• Keep project assets safe — never lose a great idea
• Know how to UNDO bad decisions — no matter when they were made
• Learn how to share code safely, and work in parallel
• See how to avoid costly code freezes
• Manage 3rd party code
• Understand how to go back in time, and work on previous versions

Imagine you’re using the world’s most sophisticated word processor: it has every function imaginable, except one. For some reason, they forgot to add support for an UNDO command. Think how carefully and slowly you’d have to type—especially as you got near the end of a large document. One mistake, and you’d have to start over. Version control gives your team a project-wide undo button: nothing is final, and mistakes are easily rolled back.

With version control, you’ll never again lose a good idea because someone overwrote your file edits. You can always find out easily who made what changes to the source code—and why.

You no longer have to freeze development when producing a release: a version control system allows you to support multiple releases of your software at the same time, so you can continue with the main line of development.

Version control is a project-wide time machine. Now you can dial in a date and see exactly what the project looked like yesterday, last Tuesday or even last year.

AND IT’S EASY TO DO. Using a version control system does not have to be complicated, or time-consuming, or expensive. Pragmatic Version Control can show you how to set up and use a version control system effectively and inexpensively.

“This is an excellent book; any programmer who hasn’t even heard of version control will be able to pick up all the skills necessary to use version control and be productive. I absolutely love the way the book is written. The use of scenarios to explain every example and concept just works perfectly, and best practices are included in all of the chapters.”

–Vinny Carpenter, Enterprise Architect

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