Re: CVS and Jar files: Should you import Jar into the Repository?Why or why not

[David Clunie]

Hi

We currently have about 350GB of 1MB binary image files stored in a CVS
repository in order to keep track of who created them and when, and in
rare circumstances when they are modified or replaced, who did that and
when. The application has no need for concurrent merges, since the files
are rarely modified the ',v' files take up little more space than the images
themselves, and we have had no problems with cvs messing with the format
of the binary files (which are obviously checked in -kb). We have relatively
few users hitting on the system at one time which probably is how we get
away with it.

Essentially, we use CVS like a versioning filesystem in this application,
and while it may be a little slow and unwieldy, it gets the job done, at
essentially no cost and using a tool we were already familiar with.

The thing we miss most is an "ls" command via pserver (which we use
exclusively) but if we really cared that much we could add it I suppose.
We also miss a digital signature capability on checked in files, but again
we could add that if it really mattered.

So for everyone who says we shouldn't be doing this because it wasn't
designed for it, I say point us to a better tool that is as free and
accessible and familiar as CVS and can also handle all our text and
source files, and yes, Word and PDF documents too. We don't want one
tool for text and a different one for binaries, period. Maybe Subversion
will do the job when it is finished.

By the end of the year I expect to have several TB of images stored in
this system and I will let you know if and when CVS becomes a problem.

david

PS. I also store jar files and complete tar'd up releases and all
sorts of other things in CVS so I guess I am just a heretic.