Re: [PLUG] Revision Control for the Rest of Us

[JP Vossen <jp@jpsdomain.org>]

On 11/16/2017 04:46 PM, bergman@merctech.com wrote:
> Other systems (bzr, hg) may simpler for end users (particularly
> developers), but RCS still has a vital role for system adminsitrators.
>
> It's very light-weight (no database of any kind required, versioned
> files are text and are fairly human-readable...if you enjoy curling up to
> read a nice "diff"), it's not client/server or distributed (no network
> required, no daemon required even if running locally) and it's arguably
> more secure than any 'modern' versioning system. Did you just commit the
> file "secretkey"? No problem...the versioned file is still only readable
> by the same account[s] that did the commit.

But all but 1 of those things are mostly true of the 3 main DVCS tools 
we're talking about!  :-)

1. Light-weight = yeah, OK, RCS is smaller than anything else, not sure 
I care, but OK.

2. No DB = fail, all 3 use some kind of DB inside the ./.vcs/ dir 
(meaning ./bzr/, ./git/, or ./.hg/ dir).  The plain-text hackability is 
the *only* real advantage that RCS has, I'd argue.

The concept of:
	A: Keep the current version intact at the TOP
	B: Diff the older ones back in time for forever
...that's just awesome.

3. No network or daemon required = right, no net or daemon required for 
any of them.

4. More secure = no difference, see the perms on the ./.vcs/ dir.

With today's computing resources, I'll argue that it just doesn't 
matter, and that RCS is more limiting than the others.  But...that 
doesn't really matter either, use what works for you.


> Since BSD 4.2, I haven't found a better tool for version control of
> individual system files (think stuff in /etc)....but I'm grateful to
> folks on this list for pointing out alternatives.

And there's a good point, use what works for you. :-)


> [Note that "version
> control" is absolutely not the same thing as "configuration management".]

Yup!  Nor is any of this "back ups"!!!

Later,
JP
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