CVS Pocket Reference
by Gregor N. Purdy

O'Reilly and Associates (Sebastopol, California): August 2000. Paperback: 81 pages. ISBN-10: 0-596-00003-0 Suggested retail price: $9.95 (US) Tags: backups; Computing; revision control Tactical strength: [6/10]

---

With this handy reference, I quickly created a CVS source control repository for several projects that I work on, including this review archive. I also quickly found the meaning of the code letters CVS reports when you run an update. Although CVS Pocket Reference provided all the instructions necessary for setting up a repository, I would have liked to see some additional information on the proper directory permissions for a repository. I would also have liked to see some more details about certain commands. For example, a beginning user needs to know that the add command will only add a directory's name and not the directory's contents to the repository.

All in all, I liked CVS Pocket Reference as a handy and quick tool that answers almost all everyday questions a CVS user might have, but it probably doesn't give enough information for administrators.