This article is a quick and simple walk through of the Windows shell extension
TortiseSVN for adding and editing files under Subversion version control.

Background

Among other groups and departments ITS
- Web Services has made its own steps to incorporate the Subversion version
control system into our development process. Part of the learning curve is not
only working with Subversion as a server from setting up the repository to creating
the authentication scheme but also as a client. Clients are available for a number
of different platforms (Windows, Linux, OS X, Java) to help you get your code,
documents, HTML or anything else into revision control. This is part one of a
possible series of articles documenting how to get started using these clients.

Part of our job is creating, updating, and collaborating on various HTML documents.
For me personally this involves editing a static document with Dreamweaver
my preferred method of simultaneously seeing the code and WYSIWYG layout.
Alas Dreamwever doesn’t integrate with Subversion so I wanted an easy
GUI tool for to check out content, edit it with my tool of choice,
and check the document back in while adding my comments about the changes I
made. Enter TortoiseSVN.

It is a shell extension to Window’s Explorer that gives you simple right click access to Subversion commands when looking at your files. One of the nicest benefits to TortoiseSVN is the contextual icon overlays to tell you at glance which files are under revision control and what is their status (update, changed or in conflict).

Installation

• Installing TortiseSVN requires administrative privileges and accesses to
  files in use by the Novell application launcher.
• Before you install, we we have to disable the Novell Launcher
  • Log out of your desktop
  • Check ‘Workstation Only’
  • Click ‘Advanced’
  • Select your desktop as ‘From’
  • Log in
• Download TortiseSVN
• Accept the License Agreement
• Set ‘English (GB) dictionary’ to unavailable
• Install
• Reboot
• Log in with Novell

Working

• Open ‘My Documents’
• Create a new folder called ‘My Subversion’
• Right click on ‘My Subversion’ and select ‘SVN Checkout’
• Enter the url to your repository
• Enter H:\My Documents\My Subversion for ‘Checkout directory’
• Select ‘HEAD revision’ for ‘Revision’
• Click ‘OK’

TortoiseSVN will make a local copy of the entire repository under ‘My Subversion’.
If there is a specific file or directory you want to check out you could
enter that URL instead during the checkout process.

If you are editing an existing file, make your edits then save the file locally to its location in ‘My Subversion’. Right click the file(s) and select ‘SVN Update’. This will cause TortiseSVN to connect to your Subversion repository and check to see if any changes were committed while you were working. If so you will be prompted to examine any conflicts. If not you may now right click on your file(s) and select ‘SVN Commmit’ to commit your changes on the file to the repository. A window will appear, and it is quite helpful to add a message about your change. Right click again, select ‘SVN Update’ and your change is now complete.

If you want to add new files(s), add the file(s) and any directories in the appropriate paths under your copy of the repository. Edit the files to the point you are ready to add them to the repository. When you are, right click on the file(s) and select ‘TortiseSVN’ then ‘Add’. A pop up window will appear showing the URLs the files(s) will have. The file(s) themselves will have blue ‘+’ icons overlaid. Now right click on the file(s) and select ‘SVN Commit’. A window will appear, and it is quite helpful to add a message about your change. This change is viewable in the change log for that file(s) so since this is a commit of an add enter your message as ‘Initial Import’. Right click again, select ‘SVN Update’, your change is now complete.

If you have questions see the TortoiseSVN FAQ