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Basic concepts and principles
Main functions and key bindings
Navigation and files selection
Work with files
Work with changes
Getting information about files, and other functions
Customization

The PCL-CVS package provides to user very effective way to work with the CVS, that widely used for software development, especially for open source projects1. Besides standard features, provided, the VC package, this package implements following:

This package is included into GNU Emacs's distribution starting with version 21. It also available as a package for XEmacs. For other Emacs's versions you can find source code at ftp://flint.cs.yale.edu/pub/monnier/pcl-cvs.

Basic concepts and principles

All work with package is performed in special buffer, created by PCL-CVS functions. This buffer is called *cvs*, and used to display files, their statuses and other information. Some of package's functions work only with existing directories, so you need to fetch data from a repository before running any PCL-CVS function.

During work you can navigate in buffer and perform different functions on selected (or file where cursor is placed) files. For each file in project some status is assigned, and list of available functions depends on this status.

Information in buffer is separated between several columns:

File status can has one of following values:

Added
file was added, but not yet committed to repository;
Removed
file was deleted, but not yet committed to repository;
Modified
file was changed. For this status, could be displayed additional status — merged, that means, that new changes from repository was merged with your changes without any conflicts;
Conflict
during merging of changes, a conflict was detected. Both versions of changes are written to the file, and content of original file is stored as .#FILE.VERSION. Besides conflicts due the different content of change, there are other types of conflicts, displayed as additional status: removed — you removed file, but somebody change it in repository; added — you added file, but somebody also add and commit it; modified — you changed the file, but somebody removes it from repository;
Unknown
file is not registered in repository, and also not listed as ignored file;
Up-to-date
file matches the version in repository. Additional status field provide more information about it: added — you just added it to repository; updated — file was updated from repository; patched — similar to updated, but the changes from repository was merged with your changes; committed — you just committed changes to repository;
Need-Update
repository has more up to date version of file, or file was added to repository, but not fetched to your copy;
Need-Merge
you changed file, and there are other changes in repository, so you have to merge with them;
Missing
file was removed from disk, but the cvs remove command for it wasn't performed.

Main functions and key bindings

Many of functions, implemented by the PCL-CVS package has the cvs- prefix and names, similar to names of CVS commands. Some functions could be executed only in the *cvs* buffer, that could be created one of following functions (functions usually run via M-x key binding, either via Tools menu):

cvs-update
run cvs update on specified directory;
cvs-examine
run cvs -n update command, that just check state of directory without changing directory;
cvs-status
run cvs status command on specified directory;
cvs-checkout
run cvs checkout command for specified module;
cvs-quickdir
creates the *cvs* buffer, using data from CVS/Entries files. This function is similar to the cvs-examine function, but it doesn't require access to repository.

These functions could be also executed in the *cvs* buffer — you can use M-u for cvs-update, M-e for cvs-examine, and M-s for cvs-status. You can also perform corresponding commands on selected files — O (cvs-mode-update) to update files, e (cvs-mode-examine) to update information about files, and s (cvs-mode-status) to get status information for selected files.

By default, all these functions are performed recursively, but you can change this behaviour if you pass the -l option to CVS.

Navigation and files selection

To navigation inside the *cvs* buffer user can use following functions: cvs-mode-next-line (n key) — to move to the next line, and cvs-mode-previous-line (p key) that move to previous line.

There are several functions to work with marks. To mark one file, you can use the cvs-mode-mark function (m key). To remove mark from file there is the cvs-mode-unmark function (u key). To mark all files user can use M key (cvs-mode-mark-all-files function), and to remove selection from all files, user can execute cvs-mode-unmark-all-files function, that bound to M-DEL. You can also use the cvs-mode-mark-matching-files function (% key) to mark files, which names matches given regular expressions. There is also cvs-mode-mark-on-state function (S key), that mark files with given status.

Work with files

Addition of files is very simple — just mark all needed files (usually they have Unknown status), and press a key (cvs-mode-add function). Status of files will changed to Added, and you will need to commit these changes to repository (see section Work with changes). You can also use this function for files with Removed status — this restore them.

To delete files you need to perform almost same sequence — you need to mark files, and to execute the cvs-mode-remove-file function (r key). You will asked for confirmation, and if you answer yes, then files will removed from your directory. If files are registered in CVS, then the cvs remove command also will performed. You also need to commit these changes to repository.

To update files you can run the cvs-mode-update function, that bound to O key. This will execute cvs update command for all files with Need-update status.

Sometimes, you need to keep some files, not registered in repository. Such files are displayed with Unknown status, but you can say CVS to ignore that files, just list them in the .cvsignore file. To put selected files into this file, you can use the cvs-mode-ignore function, that bound to i key.

Work with changes

To commit changes to repository you just need to select needed files, and than press c key (cvs-mode-commit) or C key (cvs-mode-commit-setup). They will create a new buffer, called *cvs-commit*, in which you can enter your commit message. After you enter message, you need to press C-c C-c, and changes will committed to repository. You can abort this procedure, if you want, just simply not executing C-c C-c. Difference between c and C is that first function preserve old content of *cvs-commit* buffer, but second — not.

If you change file, but doesn't want put changes into repository, then you can revert them by using the cvs-mode-undo-local-changes function, that bound to U key. This function remove modified file, and retrieve latest version from repository.

You can view what was changed using one of several functions. Most often used function is cvs-mode-diff, that bound to = key (and also to d =). This function show differences between modified file and it version in repository. There are also several functions to display changes:

cvs-mode-diff-head (d h)
show difference between selected files and head version of corresponding files;
cvs-mode-diff-repository (d r)
show differences between repository version of file in current branch and its head version;
cvs-mode-diff-backup (d b)
show differences between backup version of file and current version. It's very useful when you resolve conflicts in files;
cvs-mode-diff-vendor (d v)
show differences between selected files and its versions in vendor branch;
cvs-mode-diff-yesterday (d y)
show differences between selected files, and their yesterdays copies.

To work with changes you can also use Ediff and Emerge. The cvs-mode-idiff function (d e) run Ediff or Emerge (depending on current settings), that allow you interactively work with changes. If you run the cvs-mode-imerge function (d E), then you can perform interactive 3-way merge of changes.

Getting information about files, and other functions

To retrieve information about files you can use two functions. The cvs-mode-log function (l key) performs cvs log for selected files, and result is displayed in the *cvs-info* buffer. And the cvs-mode-status function (s key) performs cvs status for selected files and also displays data in the *cvs-info* buffer.

With cvs-mode-tag function (t) you can set a tag to selected files. By default, this function applied only to directories, but this behaviour from the client's settings.

Sometimes you doesn't want to display some lines in the *cvs* buffer. You can do this with either cvs-mode-remove-handled function (x), that deletes from buffer already processed line (for example, files with Up-to-date status), or with cvs-mode-acknowledge function (it bound to C-k), that simply deletes lines. Processed files can be deleted automatically if the cvs-auto-remove-handled variable has non-nil value.

To refresh *cvs* buffer, you can use cvs-mode-revert-buffer function, that bound to g key. And to leave this buffer, you can use cvs-mode-quit function (q key).

Customization

Behaviour of PCL-CVS functions depends on values of several variables, that you can customize with M-x customize-group pcl-cvs function. You can customize values of variables, faces, used to display information, etc.

1. This situation is started to change. Many new free version control systems was developed and used — Subversion, Git, Darcs, Mercurial, etc.

Last change: 05.03.2013 16:54

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