RE: Hello to all and my first question

Joseph,

Your question does not appear to be about WinCVS - you should post to the CVSNT or TortoiseCVS forums instead.  This is off topic.

These links are directly from the cvsnt.org/wiki and tortoisecvs.org web sites:
CVSNT:
http://www.cvsnt.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/cvsnt
or
news://news.cvsnt.org/support.cvsnt
TortoiseCVS:
http://sourceforge.net/mail/?group_id=48103

I do not think that the Word XML format is actually that good for diff/merge - particularly for "novices".

When working with documents it is far more common to use a 'reserved' approach where a document must be 'reserved' before work begins and becomes 'unreserved' when it is committed - CVSNT supports this as does TCVS - just put *.doc -kbx (or *.docx -kox) in cvswrappers in CVSROOT and commit it and in the CVSNT server control panel under compatibility options enable 'ignore client side kopt' so that TCVS does not override the preference.

To 'reserve' a file the user uses 'cvs edit' - the files should appear read-only by default so word will open the files in read-only mode unless the user does 'cvs edit'.

Forcing the user to be prompted for a commit message on save is not currently possible using any tool or technique I know of.

March Hare Software (who are the primary contributors to CVSNT) do have a product that can automatically commit changes to files whenever they are written called CVS4S (originally conceived for people who primarily work with documents) however it does not provide a way for the user to enter comments (since it is entirely 'automatic') and is not currently for sale though is in use internally and with at least one customer. Contact [email protected] if you are interested in this - you will also require CVS Suite or CVS Professional (the 'commercial' CVSNT Server and client tools).

I think what you are actually looking for is something like MS Sharepoint - which is nicely integrated with MS Word.  Again - March Hare Software are developing the 'next gen' CVSNT (evscm.org) and we already provide a beta showing WebDAV like Sharepoint, but the specific MS Word stuff is not in there yet, and probably wont be for a while.  If you are interested in that the best path would be to try Sharepoint and if that looks like what you want then join the EVS newsgroup to lobby for or contribute specific functions you want included (or just use Sharepoint).

Finally "CVS Suite" (the non-free version of CVSNT) does contain WinMerge with extensions that allow "textual" diffing (though not merge) of MS Word, MS PowerPoint and MS Excel files including document properties (but not visual elements like bold/italic and images).

Regards,


Arthur Barrett



-----Original Message-----
From:	[email protected] on behalf of Joseph Norris
Sent:	Tue 8/26/2008 1:09 AM
To:	[email protected]
Cc:	
Subject:	[cvsgui] Hello to all and my first question

Hello,

I will give you the situation that I am working with and I would 
appreciate any and all recommendations.

I have used CVS as a developer for many years to keep track of my source 
code, mods, merges etc....  Now I have a project where administrators 
have come to me seeking a method to keep track of the same thing but 
with there policy and office documents.  I have CVSNT installed on the 
windows 2003 file server we are using and I have installed on my local 
box tortoiseCVS.  My hope is to get this to be as simple and seamless as 
possible.  The office staff are going to begin to save all documents in 
XML format.

Although tortoiseCVS appears to be simple - ties in with the windows 
file explorer - I would like to make even simpler than that. I am 
looking for a method - via scripts or whatever - by which the users can 
check in and check out - force comments on each action and show 
conflicts when they happen.   If you are say - this guy wants a "silver 
bullet" - yes - that would be nice but I know there are no such things.

thanks.


-- 
Joseph Norris
Application Developer & Server Adminstrator
209-228-4576
[email protected]


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