Path: news.uh.edu!barrett From: mattw@atl.com (Matt Weatherford) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.reviews Subject: REVIEW: HWGRCS software revision control system Followup-To: comp.sys.amiga.programmer Date: 20 Sep 1994 19:53:20 GMT Organization: The Amiga Online Review Column - ed. Daniel Barrett Lines: 205 Sender: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu (comp.sys.amiga.reviews moderator) Distribution: world Message-ID: <35nejg$3fo@masala.cc.uh.edu> Reply-To: mattw@atl.com (Matt Weatherford) NNTP-Posting-Host: karazm.math.uh.edu Keywords: programming, revision control, configuration management, giftware Originator: barrett@karazm.math.uh.edu PRODUCT NAME HWGRCS - Heinz Wrobel's RCS, patch level 11, based on GNU RCS version 5.6.0.1. BRIEF DESCRIPTION A very nice port of the GNU RCS 5.6.0.1 package. *Many* special Amiga features have been added without sacrificing standard GNU RCS compatibility. AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION Name: Heinz Wrobel Address: Karlstr. 16 82131 Gauting Germany FAX: +49 89 850 5125 E-mail: heinz@hwg.muc.de PRICE This is not a simple GNU port and is not free. It is "giftware," meaning that you are encouraged to send the author some kind of gift: money, books, games, etc. This package has many additional features and is "supported" for registered users. All users should register with Heinz to assure that this package continues to improve. Revision Control is a crucial tool for Developers to use in a Software Engineering process. Contribute generously! The future of large software projects for the Amiga may depend on it! The full working version can be found on Aminet in the file /pub/aminet/dev/misc/HWGRCSp11.lha. SPECIAL HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS HARDWARE Hard drive is required. 1 MB RAM recommended. SOFTWARE AmigaDOS 2.04 or higher is required. COPY PROTECTION None. MACHINE USED FOR TESTING Amiga 4000/040, 4 MB Fast RAM, 2 MB Chip RAM. 120 MB IDE hard drive INSTALLATION Installation is simple: unarchive the files and stick them into a directory. There is no installation script. HWGRCS is composed of a dozen or so binary files that should be in your path and have the name "RCS:" assigned to their directory. REVIEW HWGRCS is a very thorough port of GNU's RCS. RCS stands for Revision Control System. It provides a convenient way to work with multiple versions of a file without having to keep all the old versions around. Did you make an error in the latest version of a file? Just type a command and you can restore any old version. HWGRCS stays "true" to RCS 5.6.0.1's standards for switch usage and log file format. The UNIX man pages are included, unchanged except for AmigaGuide formatting. Many individuals have ported RCS to the Amiga in the past, but Heinz's port is the most fully featured and fastidiously supported of any I have used. HWGRCS has some very useful features which are specific to the Amiga. These include: - Support for "RCS_link" files This allows one to work in one or more directories and keep the RCS library in some other place than the current directory or a subdirectory called "RCS." This feature is supported by all of the RCS programs - CI, CO, RCS, RCSDIFF, etc. This support is more thorough than that of past implementations. Also, a remote checkin (example: CI work:sw/test/hello.c) finds the RCS_link in the remote directory and checks it in, as expected. - Filename wildcard expansion Supports wildcards characters like #,?,* - Amiga Comment Leaders Comment leaders defined for popular Amiga file extensions. - Amiga Protection Bits The Amiga Protection bits and GID/UID are supported for any filesystem (network, local, etc) that supports those bits. For AS225 NFS, the "P" and "S" bits are lost on the network, but there is a mechanism for dealing with this, too! Using a special HWGRCS keyword, checked out files can get the SCRIPT or PURE bits set - or any other combination you might like. DOCUMENTATION Documentation is provided in AmigaGuide format. Both the Amiga-specific information and the standard RCS man pages are AmigaGuide documents. The documentation is well organized. It really helps to know something about RCS before using this package. There are plenty of introductions to RCS out there. Heinz has included the RCSINTRO man page, but a general knowledge of Revision Control Systems is recommended. LIKES I was impressed by the details that were included in the port. Heinz chose to implement the feature of "RCS unlock" which notifies (by mail) the user whose lock you have broken. If you have a "sendmail" program that supports "Sendmail -t {username} < {textfile}", then this RCS will automatically notify of lock breaks via email. A nice touch. All too often, ported programs leave out nice features like this. Heinz has spared no effort to produce a full-featured implementation. The Amiga-specific commands actually make RCS a lot more powerful than the stock GNU RCS. This is especially true for the wildcard matching and RCS_link feature. DISLIKES AND SUGGESTIONS The only thing I dislike is the limitations of RCS to file-by-file revision control. (This is a design limitation of RCS not the fault of HWGRCS.) Heinz is working on a port of the GNU "CVS" (Concurrent Version System) which is another level of abstraction above RCS (works with directory trees instead of individual files). COMPARISON TO OTHER SIMILAR PRODUCTS HWGRCS is far better than previous ports of RCS for the Amiga in functionality, documentation, and support. BUGS None found to date in Patch Level 11. VENDOR SUPPORT Heinz has been very good about responding to my questions and suggestions, as I am a registered site. I *STRONGLY* urge users and especially companies to support this product by registering. The quality of support is directly proportional to your registration contribution! :) HWGRCS has evolved a lot in time since I have been using it, and it just keeps getting better! This product and author have exceeded my expectations. WARRANTY N/A CONCLUSIONS This product meets the needs of our development team. We use it on a daily basis to manage our "C" code. There are a few more features we would like, but are discussing these with Heinz. Overall, HWGRCS is a very fine, professional package. It is a *MUST* for any kind of individual or corporate software development effort. Matt Weatherford Atlantis Diagnostics Int'l (206) 487-7826 mattw@atl.com --- Daniel Barrett, Moderator, comp.sys.amiga.reviews Send reviews to: amiga-reviews-submissions@math.uh.edu Request information: amiga-reviews-requests@math.uh.edu Moderator mail: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu Anonymous ftp site: math.uh.edu, in /pub/Amiga/comp.sys.amiga.reviews