cvs (1) Linux Manual Page

NAME

cvs – Concurrent Versions System

SYNOPSIS

cvs [ cvs_options ]

cvs_command [ command_options ] [ command_args ]

NOTE

This manpage is a summary of some of the features of cvs. It is auto-generated from an appendix of the CVS manual. For more in-depth documentation, please consult the Cederqvist manual (via the info CVS command or otherwise, as described in the SEE ALSO section of this manpage). Cross-references in this man page refer to nodes in the same.

CVS commands

Guide to CVS commands

This appendix describes the overall structure of cvs commands, and describes some commands in detail (others are described elsewhere; for a quick reference to cvs commands, see node `Invoking CVS’ in the CVS manual).

Structure

Overall structure of CVS commands

The overall format of all cvs commands is:

cvs [ cvs_options ] cvs_command [ command_options ] [ command_args ]

cvs

The name of the cvs program.

cvs_options

Some options that affect all sub-commands of cvs. These are described below.

cvs_command

One of several different sub-commands. Some of the commands have aliases that can be used instead; those aliases are noted in the reference manual for that command. There are only two situations where you may omit cvs_command: cvs -H elicits a list of available commands, and cvs -v displays version information on cvs itself.

command_options

Options that are specific for the command.

command_args

Arguments to the commands.

There is unfortunately some confusion between cvs_options and command_options. When given as a cvs_option, some options only affect some of the commands. When given as a command_option it may have a different meaning, and be accepted by more commands. In other words, do not take the above categorization too seriously. Look at the documentation instead.

Exit status

CVS’s exit status

cvs can indicate to the calling environment whether it succeeded or failed by setting its exit status. The exact way of testing the exit status will vary from one operating system to another. For example in a unix shell script the $? variable will be 0 if the last command returned a successful exit status, or greater than 0 if the exit status indicated failure.

If cvs is successful, it returns a successful status; if there is an error, it prints an error message and returns a failure status. The one exception to this is the cvs diff command. It will return a successful status if it found no differences, or a failure status if there were differences or if there was an error. Because this behavior provides no good way to detect errors, in the future it is possible that cvs diff will be changed to behave like the other cvs commands.

~/.cvsrc

Default options and the ~/.cvsrc file

There are some command_options that are used so often that you might have set up an alias or some other means to make sure you always specify that option. One example (the one that drove the implementation of the .cvsrc support, actually) is that many people find the default output of the diff command to be very hard to read, and that either context diffs or unidiffs are much easier to understand.

The ~/.cvsrc file is a way that you can add default options to cvs_commands within cvs, instead of relying on aliases or other shell scripts.

The format of the ~/.cvsrc file is simple. The file is searched for a line that begins with the same name as the cvs_command being executed. If a match is found, then the remainder of the line is split up (at whitespace characters) into separate options and added to the command arguments before any options from the command line.

If a command has two names (e.g., checkout and co), the official name, not necessarily the one used on the command line, will be used to match against the file. So if this is the contents of the user’s ~/.cvsrc file:

log -N

diff -uN

rdiff -u

update -Pd

checkout -P

release -d

the command cvs checkout foo would have the -P option added to the arguments, as well as cvs co foo.

With the example file above, the output from cvs diff foobar will be in unidiff format. cvs diff -c foobar will provide context diffs, as usual. Getting "old" format diffs would be slightly more complicated, because diff doesn’t have an option to specify use of the "old" format, so you would need cvs -f diff foobar.

In place of the command name you can use cvs to specify global options (see node `Global options’ in the CVS manual). For example the following line in .cvsrc

cvs -z6

causes cvs to use compression level 6.

Global options

The available cvs_options (that are given to the left of cvs_command) are:

–allow-root=rootdir

Specify legal cvsroot directory. See `Password authentication server’ in the CVS manual.

-a

Authenticate all communication between the client and the server. Only has an effect on the cvs client. As of this writing, this is only implemented when using a GSSAPI connection (see node `GSSAPI authenticated’ in the CVS manual). Authentication prevents certain sorts of attacks involving hijacking the active tcp connection. Enabling authentication does not enable encryption.

-b bindir

In cvs 1.9.18 and older, this specified that rcs programs are in the bindir directory. Current versions of cvs do not run rcs programs; for compatibility this option is accepted, but it does nothing.

-T tempdir

Use tempdir as the directory where temporary files are located. Overrides the setting of the $TMPDIR environment variable and any precompiled directory. This parameter should be specified as an absolute pathname. (When running client/server, -T affects only the local process; specifying -T for the client has no effect on the server and vice versa.)

-d cvs_root_directory

Use cvs_root_directory as the root directory pathname of the repository. Overrides the setting of the $CVSROOT environment variable. See `Repository’ in the CVS manual.

-e editor

Use editor to enter revision log information. Overrides the setting of the $CVSEDITOR and $EDITOR environment variables. For more information, see `Committing your changes’ in the CVS manual.

-f

Do not read the ~/.cvsrc file. This option is most often used because of the non-orthogonality of the cvs option set. For example, the cvs log option -N (turn off display of tag names) does not have a corresponding option to turn the display on. So if you have -N in the ~/.cvsrc entry for log, you may need to use -f to show the tag names.

-H

–help

Display usage information about the specified cvs_command (but do not actually execute the command). If you don’t specify a command name, cvs -H displays overall help for cvs, including a list of other help options.

-n

Do not change any files. Attempt to execute the cvs_command, but only to issue reports; do not remove, update, or merge any existing files, or create any new files.

Note that cvs will not necessarily produce exactly the same output as without -n. In some cases the output will be the same, but in other cases cvs will skip some of the processing that would have been required to produce the exact same output.

-Q

Cause the command to be really quiet; the command will only generate output for serious problems.

-q

Cause the command to be somewhat quiet; informational messages, such as reports of recursion through subdirectories, are suppressed.

-r

Make new working files read-only. Same effect as if the $CVSREAD environment variable is set (see node `Environment variables’ in the CVS manual). The default is to make working files writable, unless watches are on (see node `Watches’ in the CVS manual).

-s variable=value

Set a user variable (see node `Variables’ in the CVS manual).

-t

Trace program execution; display messages showing the steps of cvs activity. Particularly useful with -n to explore the potential impact of an unfamiliar command.

-v

–version

Display version and copyright information for cvs.

-w

Make new working files read-write. Overrides the setting of the $CVSREAD environment variable. Files are created read-write by default, unless $CVSREAD is set or -r is given.

-x

Encrypt all communication between the client and the server. Only has an effect on the cvs client. As of this writing, this is only implemented when using a GSSAPI connection (see node `GSSAPI authenticated’ in the CVS manual) or a Kerberos connection (see node `Kerberos authenticated’ in the CVS manual). Enabling encryption implies that message traffic is also authenticated. Encryption support is not available by default; it must be enabled using a special configure option, –enable-encryption, when you build cvs.

-z gzip-level

Set the compression level. Valid levels are 1 (high speed, low compression) to 9 (low speed, high compression), or 0 to disable compression (the default). Only has an effect on the cvs client.

Common options

Common command options

This section describes the command_options that are available across several cvs commands. These options are always given to the right of cvs_command. Not all commands support all of these options; each option is only supported for commands where it makes sense. However, when a command has one of these options you can almost always count on the same behavior of the option as in other commands. (Other command options, which are listed with the individual commands, may have different behavior from one cvs command to the other).

The history command is an exception; it supports many options that conflict even with these standard options.

-D date_spec

Use the most recent revision no later than date_spec. date_spec is a single argument, a date description specifying a date in the past.

The specification is sticky when you use it to make a private copy of a source file; that is, when you get a working file using -D, cvs records the date you specified, so that further updates in the same directory will use the same date (for more information on sticky tags/dates, see node `Sticky tags’ in the CVS manual).

-D is available with the annotate, checkout, diff, export, history, rdiff, rtag, and update commands. (The history command uses this option in a slightly different way; see node `history options’ in the CVS manual).

A wide variety of date formats are supported by cvs. The most standard ones are ISO8601 (from the International Standards Organization) and the Internet e-mail standard (specified in RFC822 as amended by RFC1123).

ISO8601 dates have many variants but a few examples are:

1972-09-24

1972-09-24 20:05

There are a lot more ISO8601 date formats, and cvs accepts many of them, but you probably don’t want to hear the whole long story :-).

In addition to the dates allowed in Internet e-mail itself, cvs also allows some of the fields to be omitted. For example:

24 Sep 1972 20:05

24 Sep

The date is interpreted as being in the local timezone, unless a specific timezone is specified.

These two date formats are preferred. However, cvs currently accepts a wide variety of other date formats. They are intentionally not documented here in any detail, and future versions of cvs might not accept all of them.

One such format is month/day/year. This may confuse people who are accustomed to having the month and day in the other order; 1/4/96 is January 4, not April 1.

Remember to quote the argument to the -D flag so that your shell doesn’t interpret spaces as argument separators. A command using the -D flag can look like this:

$ cvs diff -D "1 hour ago" cvs.texinfo

-f

When you specify a particular date or tag to cvs commands, they normally ignore files that do not contain the tag (or did not exist prior to the date) that you specified. Use the -f option if you want files retrieved even when there is no match for the tag or date. (The most recent revision of the file will be used).

Note that even with -f, a tag that you specify must exist (that is, in some file, not necessary in every file). This is so that cvs will continue to give an error if you mistype a tag name.

-f is available with these commands: annotate, checkout, export, rdiff, rtag, and update.

WARNING: The commit and remove commands also have a -f option, but it has a different behavior for those commands. See `commit options’ in the CVS manual, and `Removing files’ in the CVS manual.

-k kflag

Alter the default processing of keywords. See `Keyword substitution’ in the CVS manual, for the meaning of kflag. Your kflag specification is sticky when you use it to create a private copy of a source file; that is, when you use this option with the checkout or update commands, cvs associates your selected kflag with the file, and continues to use it with future update commands on the same file until you specify otherwise.

The -k option is available with the add, checkout, diff, rdiff, import and update commands.

-l

Local; run only in current working directory, rather than recursing through subdirectories.

Available with the following commands: annotate, checkout, commit, diff, edit, editors, export, log, rdiff, remove, rtag, status, tag, unedit, update, watch, and watchers.

-m message

Use message as log information, instead of invoking an editor.

Available with the following commands: add, commit and import.

-n

Do not run any tag program. (A program can be specified to run in the modules database (see node `modules’ in the CVS manual); this option bypasses it).

This is not the same as the cvs -n program option, which you can specify to the left of a cvs command!

Available with the checkout, export, and rtag commands.

-P

Prune empty directories. See `Removing directories’ in the CVS manual.

-p

Pipe the files retrieved from the repository to standard output, rather than writing them in the current directory. Available with the checkout and update commands.

-R

Process directories recursively. This is on by default.

Available with the following commands: annotate, checkout, commit, diff, edit, editors, export, rdiff, remove, rtag, status, tag, unedit, update, watch, and watchers.

-r tag

Use the revision specified by the tag argument instead of the default head revision. As well as arbitrary tags defined with the tag or rtag command, two special tags are always available: HEAD refers to the most recent version available in the repository, and BASE refers to the revision you last checked out into the current working directory.

The tag specification is sticky when you use this with checkout or update to make your own copy of a file: cvs remembers the tag and continues to use it on future update commands, until you specify otherwise (for more information on sticky tags/dates, see node `Sticky tags’ in the CVS manual).

The tag can be either a symbolic or numeric tag, as described in `Tags’ in the CVS manual, or the name of a branch, as described in `Branching and merging’ in the CVS manual. When a command expects a specific revision, the name of a branch is interpreted as the most recent revision on that branch.

Specifying the -q global option along with the -r command option is often useful, to suppress the warning messages when the rcs file does not contain the specified tag.

This is not the same as the overall cvs -r option, which you can specify to the left of a cvs command!

-r is available with the annotate, checkout, commit, diff, history, export, rdiff, rtag, and update commands.

-W

Specify file names that should be filtered. You can use this option repeatedly. The spec can be a file name pattern of the same type that you can specify in the .cvswrappers file. Available with the following commands: import, and update.

add

Add files and directories to the repository

•

Synopsis: add [-k rcs-kflag] [-m message] files…

•

Requires: repository, working directory.

•

Changes: repository, working directory.

The add command is used to present new files and directories for addition into the cvs repository. When add is used on a directory, a new directory is created in the repository immediately. When used on a file, only the working directory is updated. Changes to the repository are not made until the commit command is used on the newly added file.

The add command also resurrects files that have been previously removed. This can be done before or after the commit command is used to finalize the removal of files. Resurrected files are restored into the working directory at the time the add command is executed.

add options

These standard options are supported by add (see node `Common options’ in the CVS manual, for a complete description of them):

-k kflag

Process keywords according to kflag. See `Keyword substitution’ in the CVS manual. This option is sticky; future updates of this file in this working directory will use the same kflag. The status command can be viewed to see the sticky options. For more information on the status command, see node `Invoking CVS’ in the CVS manual.

-m message

Use message as the log message, instead of invoking an editor.

add examples

Adding a directory

$ mkdir doc

$ cvs add doc

Directory /path/to/repository/doc added to the repository

Adding a file

$ >TODO

$ cvs add TODO

cvs add: scheduling file `TODO’ for addition

cvs add: use ‘cvs commit’ to add this file permanently

Undoing a remove command

$ rm -f makefile

$ cvs remove makefile

cvs remove: scheduling `makefile’ for removal

cvs remove: use ‘cvs commit’ to remove this file permanently

$ cvs add makefile

U makefile

cvs add: makefile, version 1.2, resurrected

admin

Administration

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Requires: repository, working directory.

•

Changes: repository.

•

Synonym: rcs

This is the cvs interface to assorted administrative facilities. Some of them have questionable usefulness for cvs but exist for historical purposes. Some of the questionable options are likely to disappear in the future. This command does work recursively, so extreme care should be used.

On unix, if there is a group named cvsadmin, only members of that group can run cvs admin (except for the cvs admin -k command, which can be run by anybody). This group should exist on the server, or any system running the non-client/server cvs. To disallow cvs admin for all users, create a group with no users in it. On NT, the cvsadmin feature does not exist and all users can run cvs admin.

admin options

Some of these options have questionable usefulness for cvs but exist for historical purposes. Some even make it impossible to use cvs until you undo the effect!

-Aoldfile

Might not work together with cvs. Append the access list of oldfile to the access list of the rcs file.

-alogins

Might not work together with cvs. Append the login names appearing in the comma-separated list logins to the access list of the rcs file.

-b[rev]

Set the default branch to rev. In cvs, you normally do not manipulate default branches; sticky tags (see node `Sticky tags’ in the CVS manual) are a better way to decide which branch you want to work on. There is one reason to run cvs admin -b: to revert to the vendor’s version when using vendor branches (see node `Reverting local changes’ in the CVS manual). There can be no space between -b and its argument.

-cstring

Sets the comment leader to string. The comment leader is not used by current versions of cvs or rcs 5.7. Therefore, you can almost surely not worry about it. See `Keyword substitution’ in the CVS manual.

-e[logins]

Might not work together with cvs. Erase the login names appearing in the comma-separated list logins from the access list of the RCS file. If logins is omitted, erase the entire access list. There can be no space between -e and its argument.

-I

Run interactively, even if the standard input is not a terminal. This option does not work with the client/server cvs and is likely to disappear in a future release of cvs.

-i

Useless with cvs. This creates and initializes a new rcs file, without depositing a revision. With cvs, add files with the cvs add command (see node `Adding files’ in the CVS manual).

-ksubst

Set the default keyword substitution to subst. See `Keyword substitution’ in the CVS manual. Giving an explicit -k option to cvs update, cvs export, or cvs checkout overrides this default.

-l[rev]

Lock the revision with number rev. If a branch is given, lock the latest revision on that branch. If rev is omitted, lock the latest revision on the default branch. There can be no space between -l and its argument.

This can be used in conjunction with the rcslock.pl script in the contrib directory of the cvs source distribution to provide reserved checkouts (where only one user can be editing a given file at a time). See the comments in that file for details (and see the README file in that directory for disclaimers about the unsupported nature of contrib). According to comments in that file, locking must set to strict (which is the default).

-L

Set locking to strict. Strict locking means that the owner of an RCS file is not exempt from locking for checkin. For use with cvs, strict locking must be set; see the discussion under the -l option above.

-mrev:msg

Replace the log message of revision rev with msg.

-Nname[:[rev]]

Act like -n, except override any previous assignment of name. For use with magic branches, see `Magic branch numbers’ in the CVS manual.

-nname[:[rev]]

Associate the symbolic name name with the branch or revision rev. It is normally better to use cvs tag or cvs rtag instead. Delete the symbolic name if both : and rev are omitted; otherwise, print an error message if name is already associated with another number. If rev is symbolic, it is expanded before association. A rev consisting of a branch number followed by a . stands for the current latest revision in the branch. A : with an empty rev stands for the current latest revision on the default branch, normally the trunk. For example, cvs admin -nname: associates name with the current latest revision of all the RCS files; this contrasts with cvs admin -nname:$ which associates name with the revision numbers extracted from keyword strings in the corresponding working files.

-orange

Deletes (outdates) the revisions given by range.

Note that this command can be quite dangerous unless you know exactly what you are doing (for example see the warnings below about how the rev1:rev2 syntax is confusing).

If you are short on disc this option might help you. But think twice before using it—there is no way short of restoring the latest backup to undo this command! If you delete different revisions than you planned, either due to carelessness or (heaven forbid) a cvs bug, there is no opportunity to correct the error before the revisions are deleted. It probably would be a good idea to experiment on a copy of the repository first.

Specify range in one of the following ways:

rev1::rev2

Collapse all revisions between rev1 and rev2, so that cvs only stores the differences associated with going from rev1 to rev2, not intermediate steps. For example, after -o 1.3::1.5 one can retrieve revision 1.3, revision 1.5, or the differences to get from 1.3 to 1.5, but not the revision 1.4, or the differences between 1.3 and 1.4. Other examples: -o 1.3::1.4 and -o 1.3::1.3 have no effect, because there are no intermediate revisions to remove.

::rev

Collapse revisions between the beginning of the branch containing rev and rev itself. The branchpoint and rev are left intact. For example, -o ::1.3.2.6 deletes revision 1.3.2.1, revision 1.3.2.5, and everything in between, but leaves 1.3 and 1.3.2.6 intact.

rev::

Collapse revisions between rev and the end of the branch containing rev. Revision rev is left intact but the head revision is deleted.

rev

Delete the revision rev. For example, -o 1.3 is equivalent to -o 1.2::1.4.

rev1:rev2

Delete the revisions from rev1 to rev2, inclusive, on the same branch. One will not be able to retrieve rev1 or rev2 or any of the revisions in between. For example, the command cvs admin -oR_1_01:R_1_02 . is rarely useful. It means to delete revisions up to, and including, the tag R_1_02. But beware! If there are files that have not changed between R_1_02 and R_1_03 the file will have the same numerical revision number assigned to the tags R_1_02 and R_1_03. So not only will it be impossible to retrieve R_1_02; R_1_03 will also have to be restored from the tapes! In most cases you want to specify rev1::rev2 instead.

:rev

Delete revisions from the beginning of the branch containing rev up to and including rev.

rev:

Delete revisions from revision rev, including rev itself, to the end of the branch containing rev.

None of the revisions to be deleted may have branches or locks.

If any of the revisions to be deleted have symbolic names, and one specifies one of the :: syntaxes, then cvs will give an error and not delete any revisions. If you really want to delete both the symbolic names and the revisions, first delete the symbolic names with cvs tag -d, then run cvs admin -o. If one specifies the non-:: syntaxes, then cvs will delete the revisions but leave the symbolic names pointing to nonexistent revisions. This behavior is preserved for compatibility with previous versions of cvs, but because it isn’t very useful, in the future it may change to be like the :: case.

Due to the way cvs handles branches rev cannot be specified symbolically if it is a branch. See `Magic branch numbers’ in the CVS manual for an explanation.

Make sure that no-one has checked out a copy of the revision you outdate. Strange things will happen if he starts to edit it and tries to check it back in. For this reason, this option is not a good way to take back a bogus commit; commit a new revision undoing the bogus change instead (see node `Merging two revisions’ in the CVS manual).

-q

Run quietly; do not print diagnostics.

-sstate[:rev]

Useful with cvs. Set the state attribute of the revision rev to state. If rev is a branch number, assume the latest revision on that branch. If rev is omitted, assume the latest revision on the default branch. Any identifier is acceptable for state. A useful set of states is Exp (for experimental), Stab (for stable), and Rel (for released). By default, the state of a new revision is set to Exp when it is created. The state is visible in the output from cvs log (see node `log’ in the CVS manual), and in the $Log$ and $State$ keywords (see node `Keyword substitution’ in the CVS manual). Note that cvs uses the dead state for its own purposes (see node `Attic’ in the CVS manual); to take a file to or from the dead state use commands like cvs remove and cvs add (see node `Adding and removing’ in the CVS manual), not cvs admin -s.

-t[file]

Useful with cvs. Write descriptive text from the contents of the named file into the RCS file, deleting the existing text. The file pathname may not begin with –. The descriptive text can be seen in the output from cvs log (see node `log’ in the CVS manual). There can be no space between -t and its argument.

If file is omitted, obtain the text from standard input, terminated by end-of-file or by a line containing . by itself. Prompt for the text if interaction is possible; see -I.

-t-string

Similar to -tfile. Write descriptive text from the string into the rcs file, deleting the existing text. There can be no space between -t and its argument.

-U

Set locking to non-strict. Non-strict locking means that the owner of a file need not lock a revision for checkin. For use with cvs, strict locking must be set; see the discussion under the -l option above.

-u[rev]

See the option -l above, for a discussion of using this option with cvs. Unlock the revision with number rev. If a branch is given, unlock the latest revision on that branch. If rev is omitted, remove the latest lock held by the caller. Normally, only the locker of a revision may unlock it; somebody else unlocking a revision breaks the lock. This causes the original locker to be sent a commit notification (see node `Getting Notified’ in the CVS manual). There can be no space between -u and its argument.

-Vn

In previous versions of cvs, this option meant to write an rcs file which would be acceptable to rcs version n, but it is now obsolete and specifying it will produce an error.

-xsuffixes

In previous versions of cvs, this was documented as a way of specifying the names of the rcs files. However, cvs has always required that the rcs files used by cvs end in ,v, so this option has never done anything useful.

annotate

What revision modified each line of a file?

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Synopsis: annotate [options] files…

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Requires: repository.

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Synonym: blame

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Changes: nothing.

For each file in files, print the head revision of the trunk, together with information on the last modification for each line.

annotate options

These standard options are supported by annotate (see node `Common options’ in the CVS manual for a complete description of them):

-l

Local directory only, no recursion.

-R

Process directories recursively.

-f

Use head revision if tag/date not found.

-F

Annotate binary files.

-r revision

Annotate file as of specified revision/tag.

-D date

Annotate file as of specified date.

annotate example

For example:

$ cvs annotate ssfile

Annotations for ssfile

***************

1.1 (mary 27-Mar-96): ssfile line 1

1.2 (joe 28-Mar-96): ssfile line 2

The file ssfile currently contains two lines. The ssfile line 1 line was checked in by mary on March 27. Then, on March 28, joe added a line ssfile line 2, without modifying the ssfile line 1 line. This report doesn’t tell you anything about lines which have been deleted or replaced; you need to use cvs diff for that (see node `diff’ in the CVS manual).

The options to cvs annotate are listed in `Invoking CVS’ in the CVS manual, and can be used to select the files and revisions to annotate. The options are described in more detail there and in `Common options’ in the CVS manual.

checkout

Check out sources for editing

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Synopsis: checkout [options] modules…

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Requires: repository.

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Changes: working directory.

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Synonyms: co, get

Create or update a working directory containing copies of the source files specified by modules. You must execute checkout before using most of the other cvs commands, since most of them operate on your working directory.

The modules are either symbolic names for some collection of source directories and files, or paths to directories or files in the repository. The symbolic names are defined in the modules file. See `modules’ in the CVS manual.

Depending on the modules you specify, checkout may recursively create directories and populate them with the appropriate source files. You can then edit these source files at any time (regardless of whether other software developers are editing their own copies of the sources); update them to include new changes applied by others to the source repository; or commit your work as a permanent change to the source repository.

Note that checkout is used to create directories. The top-level directory created is always added to the directory where checkout is invoked, and usually has the same name as the specified module. In the case of a module alias, the created sub-directory may have a different name, but you can be sure that it will be a sub-directory, and that checkout will show the relative path leading to each file as it is extracted into your private work area (unless you specify the -Q global option).

The files created by checkout are created read-write, unless the -r option to cvs (see node `Global options’ in the CVS manual) is specified, the CVSREAD environment variable is specified (see node `Environment variables’ in the CVS manual), or a watch is in effect for that file (see node `Watches’ in the CVS manual).

Note that running checkout on a directory that was already built by a prior checkout is also permitted. This is similar to specifying the -d option to the update command in the sense that new directories that have been created in the repository will appear in your work area. However, checkout takes a module name whereas update takes a directory name. Also to use checkout this way it must be run from the top level directory (where you originally ran checkout from), so before you run checkout to update an existing directory, don’t forget to change your directory to the top level directory.

For the output produced by the checkout command, see node `update output’ in the CVS manual.

checkout options

These standard options are supported by checkout (see node `Common options’ in the CVS manual for a complete description of them):

-D date

Use the most recent revision no later than date. This option is sticky, and implies -P. See `Sticky tags’ in the CVS manual for more information on sticky tags/dates.

-f

Only useful with the -D date or -r tag flags. If no matching revision is found, retrieve the most recent revision (instead of ignoring the file).

-k kflag

Process keywords according to kflag. See `Keyword substitution’ in the CVS manual. This option is sticky; future updates of this file in this working directory will use the same kflag. The status command can be viewed to see the sticky options. See `Invoking CVS’ in the CVS manual for more information on the status command.

-l

Local; run only in current working directory.

-n

Do not run any checkout program (as specified with the -o option in the modules file; see node `modules’ in the CVS manual).

-P

Prune empty directories. See `Moving directories’ in the CVS manual.

-p

Pipe files to the standard output.

-R

Checkout directories recursively. This option is on by default.

-r tag

Use revision tag. This option is sticky, and implies -P. See `Sticky tags’ in the CVS manual, for more information on sticky tags/dates.

In addition to those, you can use these special command options with checkout:

-A

Reset any sticky tags, dates, or -k options. Does not reset sticky -k options on modified files. See `Sticky tags’ in the CVS manual for more information on sticky tags/dates.

-c

Copy the module file, sorted, to the standard output, instead of creating or modifying any files or directories in your working directory.

-d dir

Create a directory called dir for the working files, instead of using the module name. In general, using this flag is equivalent to using mkdir dir; cd dir followed by the checkout command without the -d flag.

There is an important exception, however. It is very convenient when checking out a single item to have the output appear in a directory that doesn’t contain empty intermediate directories. In this case only, cvs tries to “shorten” pathnames to avoid those empty directories.

For example, given a module foo that contains the file bar.c, the command cvs co -d dir foo will create directory dir and place bar.c inside. Similarly, given a module bar which has subdirectory baz wherein there is a file quux.c, the command cvs co -d dir bar/baz will create directory dir and place quux.c inside.

Using the -N flag will defeat this behavior. Given the same module definitions above, cvs co -N -d dir foo will create directories dir/foo and place bar.c inside, while cvs co -N -d dir bar/baz will create directories dir/bar/baz and place quux.c inside.

-j tag

With two -j options, merge changes from the revision specified with the first -j option to the revision specified with the second j option, into the working directory.

With one -j option, merge changes from the ancestor revision to the revision specified with the -j option, into the working directory. The ancestor revision is the common ancestor of the revision which the working directory is based on, and the revision specified in the -j option.

In addition, each -j option can contain an optional date specification which, when used with branches, can limit the chosen revision to one within a specific date. An optional date is specified by adding a colon (:) to the tag: -jSymbolic_Tag:Date_Specifier.

See `Branching and merging’ in the CVS manual.

-N

Only useful together with -d dir. With this option, cvs will not “shorten” module paths in your working directory when you check out a single module. See the -d flag for examples and a discussion.

-s

Like -c, but include the status of all modules, and sort it by the status string. See `modules’ in the CVS manual, for info about the -s option that is used inside the modules file to set the module status.

checkout examples

Get a copy of the module tc:

$ cvs checkout tc

Get a copy of the module tc as it looked one day ago:

$ cvs checkout -D yesterday tc

commit

Check files into the repository

•

Synopsis: commit [-lRf] [-m ‘log_message’ | -F file] [-r revision] [files…]

•

Requires: working directory, repository.

•

Changes: repository.

•

Synonym: ci

Use commit when you want to incorporate changes from your working source files into the source repository.

If you don’t specify particular files to commit, all of the files in your working current directory are examined. commit is careful to change in the repository only those files that you have really changed. By default (or if you explicitly specify the -R option), files in subdirectories are also examined and committed if they have changed; you can use the -l option to limit commit to the current directory only.

commit verifies that the selected files are up to date with the current revisions in the source repository; it will notify you, and exit without committing, if any of the specified files must be made current first with update (see node `update’ in the CVS manual). commit does not call the update command for you, but rather leaves that for you to do when the time is right.

When all is well, an editor is invoked to allow you to enter a log message that will be written to one or more logging programs (see node `modules’ in the CVS manual, and see node `loginfo’ in the CVS manual) and placed in the rcs file inside the repository. This log message can be retrieved with the log command; see node `log’ in the CVS manual. You can specify the log message on the command line with the -m message option, and thus avoid the editor invocation, or use the -F file option to specify that the argument file contains the log message.

commit options

These standard options are supported by commit (see node `Common options’ in the CVS manual for a complete description of them):

-l

Local; run only in current working directory.

-R

Commit directories recursively. This is on by default.

-r revision

Commit to revision. revision must be either a branch, or a revision on the main trunk that is higher than any existing revision number (see node `Assigning revisions’ in the CVS manual). You cannot commit to a specific revision on a branch.

commit also supports these options:

-F file

Read the log message from file, instead of invoking an editor.

-f

Note that this is not the standard behavior of the -f option as defined in `Common options’ in the CVS manual.

Force cvs to commit a new revision even if you haven’t made any changes to the file. If the current revision of file is 1.7, then the following two commands are equivalent:

$ cvs commit -f file

$ cvs commit -r 1.8 file

The -f option disables recursion (i.e., it implies -l). To force cvs to commit a new revision for all files in all subdirectories, you must use -f -R.

-m message

Use message as the log message, instead of invoking an editor.

commit examples

Committing to a branch

You can commit to a branch revision (one that has an even number of dots) with the -r option. To create a branch revision, use the -b option of the rtag or tag commands (see node `Branching and merging’ in the CVS manual). Then, either checkout or update can be used to base your sources on the newly created branch. From that point on, all commit changes made within these working sources will be automatically added to a branch revision, thereby not disturbing main-line development in any way. For example, if you had to create a patch to the 1.2 version of the product, even though the 2.0 version is already under development, you might do:

$ cvs rtag -b -r FCS1_2 FCS1_2_Patch product_module

$ cvs checkout -r FCS1_2_Patch product_module

$ cd product_module

[[ hack away ]]

$ cvs commit

This works automatically since the -r option is sticky.

Creating the branch after editing

Say you have been working on some extremely experimental software, based on whatever revision you happened to checkout last week. If others in your group would like to work on this software with you, but without disturbing main-line development, you could commit your change to a new branch. Others can then checkout your experimental stuff and utilize the full benefit of cvs conflict resolution. The scenario might look like:

[[ hacked sources are present ]]

$ cvs tag -b EXPR1

$ cvs update -r EXPR1

$ cvs commit

The update command will make the -r EXPR1 option sticky on all files. Note that your changes to the files will never be removed by the update command. The commit will automatically commit to the correct branch, because the -r is sticky. You could also do like this:

[[ hacked sources are present ]]

$ cvs tag -b EXPR1

$ cvs commit -r EXPR1

but then, only those files that were changed by you will have the -r EXPR1 sticky flag. If you hack away, and commit without specifying the -r EXPR1 flag, some files may accidentally end up on the main trunk.

To work with you on the experimental change, others would simply do

$ cvs checkout -r EXPR1 whatever_module

diff

Show differences between revisions

•

Synopsis: diff [-lR] [-k kflag] [format_options] [[-r rev1 | -D date1] [-r rev2 | -D date2]] [files…]

•

Requires: working directory, repository.

•

Changes: nothing.

The diff command is used to compare different revisions of files. The default action is to compare your working files with the revisions they were based on, and report any differences that are found.

If any file names are given, only those files are compared. If any directories are given, all files under them will be compared.

The exit status for diff is different than for other cvs commands; for details see node `Exit status’ in the CVS manual.

diff options

These standard options are supported by diff (see node `Common options’ in the CVS manual for a complete description of them):

-D date

Use the most recent revision no later than date. See -r for how this affects the comparison.

-k kflag

Process keywords according to kflag. See `Keyword substitution’ in the CVS manual.

-l

Local; run only in current working directory.

-R

Examine directories recursively. This option is on by default.

-r tag

Compare with revision tag. Zero, one or two -r options can be present. With no -r option, the working file will be compared with the revision it was based on. With one -r, that revision will be compared to your current working file. With two -r options those two revisions will be compared (and your working file will not affect the outcome in any way).

One or both -r options can be replaced by a -D date option, described above.

The following options specify the format of the output. They have the same meaning as in GNU diff. Most options have two equivalent names, one of which is a single letter preceded by –, and the other of which is a long name preceded by —.

–lines

Show lines (an integer) lines of context. This option does not specify an output format by itself; it has no effect unless it is combined with -c or -u. This option is obsolete. For proper operation, patch typically needs at least two lines of context.

-a

Treat all files as text and compare them line-by-line, even if they do not seem to be text.

-b

Ignore trailing white space and consider all other sequences of one or more white space characters to be equivalent.

-B

Ignore changes that just insert or delete blank lines.

–binary

Read and write data in binary mode.

–brief

Report only whether the files differ, not the details of the differences.

-c

Use the context output format.

-C lines

–context[=lines]

Use the context output format, showing lines (an integer) lines of context, or three if lines is not given. For proper operation, patch typically needs at least two lines of context.

–changed-group-format=format

Use format to output a line group containing differing lines from both files in if-then-else format. See `Line group formats’ in the CVS manual.

-d

Change the algorithm to perhaps find a smaller set of changes. This makes diff slower (sometimes much slower).

-e

–ed

Make output that is a valid ed script.

–expand-tabs

Expand tabs to spaces in the output, to preserve the alignment of tabs in the input files.

-f

Make output that looks vaguely like an ed script but has changes in the order they appear in the file.

-F regexp

In context and unified format, for each hunk of differences, show some of the last preceding line that matches regexp.

–forward-ed

Make output that looks vaguely like an ed script but has changes in the order they appear in the file.

-H

Use heuristics to speed handling of large files that have numerous scattered small changes.

–horizon-lines=lines

Do not discard the last lines lines of the common prefix and the first lines lines of the common suffix.

-i

Ignore changes in case; consider upper- and lower-case letters equivalent.

-I regexp

Ignore changes that just insert or delete lines that match regexp.

–ifdef=name

Make merged if-then-else output using name.

–ignore-all-space

Ignore white space when comparing lines.

–ignore-blank-lines

Ignore changes that just insert or delete blank lines.

–ignore-case

Ignore changes in case; consider upper- and lower-case to be the same.

–ignore-matching-lines=regexp

Ignore changes that just insert or delete lines that match regexp.

–ignore-space-change

Ignore trailing white space and consider all other sequences of one or more white space characters to be equivalent.

–initial-tab

Output a tab rather than a space before the text of a line in normal or context format. This causes the alignment of tabs in the line to look normal.

-L label

Use label instead of the file name in the context format and unified format headers.

–label=label

Use label instead of the file name in the context format and unified format headers.

–left-column

Print only the left column of two common lines in side by side format.

–line-format=format

Use format to output all input lines in if-then-else format. See `Line formats’ in the CVS manual.

–minimal

Change the algorithm to perhaps find a smaller set of changes. This makes diff slower (sometimes much slower).

-n

Output RCS-format diffs; like -f except that each command specifies the number of lines affected.

-N

–new-file

In directory comparison, if a file is found in only one directory, treat it as present but empty in the other directory.

–new-group-format=format

Use format to output a group of lines taken from just the second file in if-then-else format. See `Line group formats’ in the CVS manual.

–new-line-format=format

Use format to output a line taken from just the second file in if-then-else format. See `Line formats’ in the CVS manual.

–old-group-format=format

Use format to output a group of lines taken from just the first file in if-then-else format. See `Line group formats’ in the CVS manual.

–old-line-format=format

Use format to output a line taken from just the first file in if-then-else format. See `Line formats’ in the CVS manual.

-p

Show which C function each change is in.

–rcs

Output RCS-format diffs; like -f except that each command specifies the number of lines affected.

–report-identical-files

-s

Report when two files are the same.

–show-c-function

Show which C function each change is in.

–show-function-line=regexp

In context and unified format, for each hunk of differences, show some of the last preceding line that matches regexp.

–side-by-side

Use the side by side output format.

–speed-large-files

Use heuristics to speed handling of large files that have numerous scattered small changes.

–suppress-common-lines

Do not print common lines in side by side format.

-t

Expand tabs to spaces in the output, to preserve the alignment of tabs in the input files.

-T

Output a tab rather than a space before the text of a line in normal or context format. This causes the alignment of tabs in the line to look normal.

–text

Treat all files as text and compare them line-by-line, even if they do not appear to be text.

-u

Use the unified output format.

–unchanged-group-format=format

Use format to output a group of common lines taken from both files in if-then-else format. see node `Line group formats’ in the CVS manual.

–unchanged-line-format=format

Use format to output a line common to both files in if-then-else format. see node `Line formats’ in the CVS manual.

-U lines

–unified[=lines]

Use the unified output format, showing lines (an integer) lines of context, or three if lines is not given. For proper operation, patch typically needs at least two lines of context.

-w

Ignore white space when comparing lines.

-W columns

–width=columns

Use an output width of columns in side by side format.

-y

Use the side by side output format.

Line group formats

Line group formats let you specify formats suitable for many applications that allow if-then-else input, including programming languages and text formatting languages. A line group format specifies the output format for a contiguous group of similar lines.

For example, the following command compares the TeX file myfile with the original version from the repository, and outputs a merged file in which old regions are surrounded by egin{em}–nd{em} lines, and new regions are surrounded by egin{bf}–nd{bf} lines.

cvs diff \

–old-group-format=’egin{em}

%<nd{em}

‘ \

–new-group-format=’egin{bf}

%>nd{bf}

‘ \

myfile

The following command is equivalent to the above example, but it is a little more verbose, because it spells out the default line group formats.

cvs diff \

–old-group-format=’egin{em}

%<nd{em}

‘ \

–new-group-format=’egin{bf}

%>nd{bf}

‘ \

–unchanged-group-format=’%=’ \

–changed-group-format=’egin{em}

%<nd{em}

egin{bf}

%>nd{bf}

‘ \

myfile

Here is a more advanced example, which outputs a diff listing with headers containing line numbers in a “plain English” style.

cvs diff \

–unchanged-group-format=” \

–old-group-format=’——– %dn line%(n=1?:s) deleted at %df:

%<‘ \

–new-group-format=’——– %dN line%(N=1?:s) added after %de:

%>’ \

–changed-group-format=’——– %dn line%(n=1?:s) changed at %df:

%<——– to:

%>’ \

myfile

To specify a line group format, use one of the options listed below. You can specify up to four line group formats, one for each kind of line group. You should quote format, because it typically contains shell metacharacters.

–old-group-format=format

These line groups are hunks containing only lines from the first file. The default old group format is the same as the changed group format if it is specified; otherwise it is a format that outputs the line group as-is.

–new-group-format=format

These line groups are hunks containing only lines from the second file. The default new group format is same as the changed group format if it is specified; otherwise it is a format that outputs the line group as-is.

–changed-group-format=format

These line groups are hunks containing lines from both files. The default changed group format is the concatenation of the old and new group formats.

–unchanged-group-format=format

These line groups contain lines common to both files. The default unchanged group format is a format that outputs the line group as-is.

In a line group format, ordinary characters represent themselves; conversion specifications start with % and have one of the following forms.

%<

stands for the lines from the first file, including the trailing newline. Each line is formatted according to the old line format (see node `Line formats’ in the CVS manual).

%>

stands for the lines from the second file, including the trailing newline. Each line is formatted according to the new line format.

%=

stands for the lines common to both files, including the trailing newline. Each line is formatted according to the unchanged line format.

%%

stands for %.

%c’C‘

where C is a single character, stands for C. C may not be a backslash or an apostrophe. For example, %c’:’ stands for a colon, even inside the then-part of an if-then-else format, which a colon would normally terminate.

%c’\O‘

where O is a string of 1, 2, or 3 octal digits, stands for the character with octal code O. For example, %c’