Recipe 6.7 Examining the CVS Repository

6.7.1 Problem

You want to explore the CVS repository from inside Eclipse.

6.7.2 Solution

Use the CVS Repository Exploring perspective. Open this perspective by selecting Window Open Perspective Other CVS Repository Exploring. Or, if you've opened this perspective in the past—which means Eclipse will have added it to the Open Perspective menu—select Window Open Perspective CVS Repository Exploring.

6.7.3 Discussion

The CVS Repository Exploring perspective enables you to see what's inside the CVS repository. For example, you can see the entire GreetingApp project, all the way down to the GreetingClass.java file, in the CVS Repositories view at left in Figure 6-8.

Figure 6-8. The CVS repository perspective

This project, GreetingApp, is in the repository's HEAD section, which is the main development stream.

Also note the CVSROOT directory, which holds CVS administrative data; the Branches node, which holds any files in other branches of development; and the Versions node, which holds explicitly labeled versions.

6.7.3.1 Eclipse 3.0

In Eclipse 3.0, you can determine who's responsible for a bug. You right-click a file and select Team Show Annotation to open a CVS Annotation view showing the selected file in the CVS Repositories view. When you select a line in the editor, the CVS Annotation view reveals who released that edit to the file.

6.7.4 See Also

Recipe 6.8 on checking projects out of a CVS repository; Recipe 6.13 on creating CVS branches; Chapter 4 of Eclipse (O'Reilly).