Over the last day or so I have been looking into the git-svn tool. It sounds like a tool that will be very helpful for me at work. My work currently uses a subversion repository and I am very close to being converted from a Subversion fan to a git fan.

I am going to try to use this post as an attempt document my learning of the new tool in hopes that it helps others learn about what a great tool this could be.

Starting out! Lets create a subversion repository to test with. (You can skip this step if you have a Subversion repository you are currently using)

svnadmin create svnrepo

After creating the repository lets procede to set it up as described in the svnbook.

svn co file:///path/to/svnrepo svncopy
cd svncopy
mkdir trunk
mkdir tags
mkdir branches
echo "Hello World" > trunk/README
svn add trunk tags branches
svn ci -m "Adding repository structure"

Now to start using git-svn! Lets clone the subversion repository.

cd ..
git svn clone -s file:///path/to/svnrepo gitcopy

If your repository is large, you can choose to use the -r argument to pick a more recent version to clone from (ex. -r 1000:HEAD).

Notice that when cloning only the trunk is pulled down - this is slightly differnt than the checkout command with Subversion.

Lets experiment with how commits and updates are handled.

There are two ways to look at history the following will give you a log close to Subversion.

cd gitcopy
git svn log

Where as this command will give you the git log.

git log

Lets go into the svncopy modify the README and commit it.

cd ../svncopy
echo "Hello Again" > trunk/README
svn ci -m "Adding more to Readme."

Now lets grab the changes (subversion update) in the git svn copy

cd ../gitcopy
git svn rebase

We know have the changes from the svncopy in the gitcopy.

Since gits workflow is inheriently different than subversion, commiting from the gitcopy to svnrepo takes a few more steps.

cd ../gitcopy
echo "Hello from git" > README
git commit -a -m "More information to README"
echo "Hello from git svn" > README
git commit -a -m "Fixed message in readme"
git svn dcommit

The log on the subversion side looks as follows:

svn up
Updating '.':
U    trunk/README
Updated to revision 4.
svn log
------------------------------------------------------------------------
r4 | me | 2015-11-22 11:55:12 -0600 (Sun, 22 Nov 2015) | 1 line

Fixed message in readme
------------------------------------------------------------------------
r3 | me | 2015-11-22 11:55:12 -0600 (Sun, 22 Nov 2015) | 1 line

More information to README
------------------------------------------------------------------------
r2 | me | 2015-11-22 11:24:37 -0600 (Sun, 22 Nov 2015) | 1 line

Adding more to README
------------------------------------------------------------------------
r1 | me | 2015-11-22 11:09:01 -0600 (Sun, 22 Nov 2015) | 1 line

Adding repository structure
------------------------------------------------------------------------

So, it looks like it pushes each git commit as a svn commit when using the dcommit command. I probably should have used different usernames from both git and svn.

Branching turned out to be a lot more tricky than I anticipated, so that will have to wait until next time.