What is Subversion?

Subversion is a version control system that will track all changes made to files and folders (directories).

Software development is an evolving process. Code often starts in a basic form, such as a simple signup form on a website. Usually, the client you made the form for realises it also has to support a second language or requires the functionality to upload an attachment.

You can still hack this in, but the feature requests keep stacking. Eventually, more validation has to be done, the form has to check another database to see if the data is valid, and the whole process becomes more complex.

Sounds familiar?

Keep your coding projects organized

Changing requirements do not have to be a problem. With Subversion you can easily keep track of all changes you make to the software you are building.

Imagine you are adding a new feature which happens to break another feature you implemented months ago. Using Subversion allows you to quickly revert back a version or two to make sure what you are running is still stable.

Subversion is all about collaboration

Making use of Subversion for a project you are the only developer on can be useful, but it’s true potential shows when you are working on a project with a number of developers.

Every developer has his/her own checkout which means they each have a personal environment to work in as they add features to the software.

Once the new feature has been tested and is ready to go, the developer can commit his/her new code to the repository.

Tracking changes

The repository tracks the changes to the codebase. Every time a developer commits his/her code, a version number is given to the new addition(s). The developer is able  add comments to his committed code so that other developers can easily understand the changes that are made. By updating their checkout, other developers can easily view all the changes made to the project.

Benefits of using Subversion

This trackable way of working has a number of advantages:

• more developers can work on the same code at the same time,
• if a computer crashes, the code is still accessible to the developer through any other machine,
• everything you commit will be securely hosted on our servers which are frequently backed up,
• you can quickly revert to a previous (stable) version if an update breaks something or pesky bugs arise.

Get started today

Want to work on projects in a more organized, efficient way with your team? Getting started with Subversion is easy. Select the right Subversion hosting plan for your project and, before you know it, your whole team will be committing to the codebase and updating it quickly and easily.