Configuring the biowikifarm subversion repository

This topic is about creating and configuring the repository on the server itself. For help with using or managing subversion, see Help: Subversion.

Configuration

Configuring a subversion repository, with svn already installed through apt-get, on Debian 5. The procedure was contributed by an anonymous helper. First: in /etc/apache2/mods-enabled/dav_svn.conf enable several lines:

<Location /svn>
DAV svn
SVNPath /var/lib/svn
AuthType Basic
AuthName "Subversion Repository"
AuthUserFile /etc/apache2/dav_svn.passwd
Require valid-user
AuthzSVNAccessFile /etc/apache2/dav_svn.authz
</Location>

Password file and users

 sudo htpasswd -c /etc/apache2/dav_svn.passwd user ## only for first user
 sudo htpasswd /etc/apache2/dav_svn.passwd user1
 sudo htpasswd /etc/apache2/dav_svn.passwd user2 ## etc.

Create access control file and reload:

 sudo nano /etc/apache2/dav_svn.authz

 # Read/write permission for all SVN users:
 [/]
 * = rw

 sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 reload

SVN-Repository

Creating SVN-Repository, access only to Webserver:

 sudo mkdir /var/lib/svn
 sudo svnadmin create /var/lib/svn/
 sudo chown -R www-data.www-data /var/lib/svn/

Now one can check versions directly inside the browser using https://biowikifarm.net/svn/ or check locally out using a svn client:

 svn co https://biowikifarm.net/svn/

To increase comfort we can ensure that committing to the webserver the most recent version is updated also in server’s repositories (i.e. with every commit from a normal subversion user, the webserver-local checkout is updated by a post-commit later on):

 # set password for www-data, use a random password, it will be stored plain text:
 sudo htpasswd /etc/apache2/dav_svn.passwd www-data 
 <PASSWORD>
 sudo -s #  -s (shell) 
 # chown -R www-data.www-data /var/www/v-artenquiz
 # www-data needs a folder to store svn-configuration (esp. a plaintext password needs to be set and then stored):
 sudo mkdir /var/www/.subversion
 sudo chown www-data.www-data /var/www/.subversion/
 ### Original instructions: do folders, checkouts as www-data
 # sudo su - www-data # change user to www-data
 ### NOTE: ultimately we did this NOT as www-data, but root ###
  sudo mv /var/www/v-artenquiz /var/www/v-artenquiz-DELETE-ME-LATER
  sudo mkdir /var/www/v-artenquiz; cd /var/www/v-artenquiz
  sudo svn checkout file:///var/lib/svn/artenquiz /var/www/v-artenquiz
  sudo chown www-data.www-data /var/www/v-artenquiz

  sudo mv    /usr/share/mediawiki/ext-LOCAL-svn /usr/share/mediawiki/ext-LOCAL-svn-DELETE-ME-LATER
  sudo mkdir /usr/share/mediawiki/ext-LOCAL-svn;
  sudo cd    /usr/share/mediawiki/ext-LOCAL-svn; 
  sudo svn checkout file:///var/lib/svn/LocalSVNextensions /usr/share/mediawiki/ext-LOCAL-svn
  sudo chown www-data.www-data /usr/share/mediawiki/ext-LOCAL-svn

  sudo mv    /usr/share/mediawikistaging/ext-LOCAL-svn /usr/share/mediawikistaging/ext-LOCAL-svn-DELETE-ME-LATER
  sudo mkdir /usr/share/mediawikistaging/ext-LOCAL-svn;
  sudo cd    /usr/share/mediawikistaging/ext-LOCAL-svn; 
  sudo svn checkout file:///var/lib/svn/LocalSVNextensions /usr/share/mediawikistaging/ext-LOCAL-svn
  sudo chown www-data.www-data /usr/share/mediawikistaging/ext-LOCAL-svn

Continuing as normal user, edit/create file

 sudo nano /var/lib/svn/hooks/post-commit

with:

#!/bin/sh
REPOS="$1"
REV="$2"
HOME=/var/www # define HOME for settings in $HOME/.subversion
cd /var/www/v-artenquiz;                      /usr/bin/svn update
cd /usr/share/mediawiki/ext-LOCAL-svn;        /usr/bin/svn update
cd /usr/share/mediawikistaging/ext-LOCAL-svn; /usr/bin/svn update

… and set this file as executable:

 sudo chmod +x /var/lib/svn/hooks/post-commit

By means of this post-commit-hook, whenever a commit to SVN occurs, www/v-artenquiz is automatically updated as well!

Adding new directories

Adding new directories to the repository, the easiest way is to use a GUI like TortoiseSVN (Windows) or kdesvn (Linux KDE).

1. check out the repository
2. add or copy your folders you wish to add to the repository and add them to subversion control first (now subversion add them to version control)
3. commit those new files or folders (needs a user account in dav)

An alternative is to use svn import in command line with

  sudo svn import LocalSVNextensions file:///var/lib/svn/LocalSVNextensions -m 'import of mediawiki LocalSVNextensions'

Adding log edit feature

cd /var/lib/svn/hooks/
# use templates provided by subversion
sudo cp  pre-revprop-change.tmpl pre-revprop-change 
# make it executable
sudo chmod +x pre-revprop-change

Now you are able to edit/or set log entries from a specific subversion revision number -r by:

1 cd /path/to/versioned/directory/
2 # edit log entry with editor
3 sudo svn propedit -r123 --revprop svn:log
4 # set log entry
5 sudo svn propset -r123 --revprop svn:log "new log message"

See also http://subversion.apache.org/faq.html#change-log-msg.