[sldev] Setting up source version control, for beginners?

[Kel Hartunian]

Ricky wrote:
> On Windoze I find that I like TortoiseSVN (
> http://tortoisesvn.tigris.org/ ) for accessing existing repositories.
>
> If you want a standalone versioning system... I'm at a loss... I've
> always built a full Subversion repository on my Linux box.  Not hard
> to do on most common distros.
>
> Ricky
>
> On Thu, Jul 24, 2008 at 6:39 PM, Ryan Williams (Which)
> <rdw at lindenlab.com <mailto:rdw at lindenlab.com>> wrote:
>
>     Jason Giglio wrote:
>
>         Dale Mahalko wrote:
>          
>
>             I am (again) starting to poke at the source and I see what
>             a huge
>             undertaking it is to edit a raw directory source files. I
>             have to keep
>             track of what I changed, where I changed it, and what the
>             original
>             looked like in case I ever want to revert my changes or
>             compare to the
>             original.
>
>             I have absolutely no experience with version control but
>             it looks like
>             I'm going to need to learn how to use it.
>
>                
>
>
>         No, not really.  You can do those basic tasks above with
>         simpler tools.
>          You will need to learn/use diff, patch, and possibly rsync
>         and the svn
>         client only.
>
>         For just a single user editing the source, you really don't
>         need a full
>         version control server setup.
>          
>
>     Mercurial is a nice choice for the single-user case because you
>     don't have to set up a server.  Just 'hg init' and 'hg addremove'
>     in your directory and you're good to go*.  It's all self-contained.
>
>     -RYaN
>
>     * Not sure if this is the exactly the precise set of commands you
>     want to issue, but it's pretty close.
>
>

I'm going to be teaching a high school computer programming course this
year.  The language will be Java, since that's what the UIL uses and the
College Board uses for their CS courses.  After this year, I'll be
making it an AP course.

Anyway, I want to let my students utilize the greatness of version
control, but I'd like to use an accessible, "learn in an hour and go"
solution for the kids. Does anyone have a suggestion?  Server based is
fine, as I'll be setting up an Ubuntu server for some different projects
the kids'll be doing.

-Kel