CVS vs VSS

[Aaron Kelley]

We are just beginning to use CVS for our project development and there has been a little friction from users who have used Microsoft Visual Source Safe before.  I have somehow become the source of information for CVS and I am looking for answers to a few complaints I have received.

 

First, one of the biggest complaints is that when tools are used within our IDE (JBuilder) to refactor code, files may be moved and deleted.  The problem is that when a commit is made, the new files are not automatically added and the old files are deleted locally, but not in the repository.  I know there are plenty of manual ways to do it, but the argument being used is that this approach will not scale as we add more developers and the repository will be filled with old files and lack new files.

 

Second, is there a way to compare all of local files with all of the files in the CVS repository and get a list of files out of sink, files that exist locally and not in the repository, and files in the repository and not locally?

 

Third, what happens when a file is moved in the repository and someone with a local copy does an update?  Does their local file get deleted?  If not, do they have to delete it manually?

 

Fourth, can you control who controls can write to what files?  What type of permission control can be added?

 

Basically, the biggest two problems are lack of control and lack of tools to automate processes.  If I could solve these problems, then it might be acceptable.  We are using a combination of Win CVS and Tortoise CVS.  There is a tool for JBuilder that provides much of this integration, but only comes with the enterprise version ($3000).

 

I would appreciate any answers or places where I can find answers.

 

Thanks,

Aaron