svn-bisect

SVN-BISECT(1)               General Commands Manual              SVN-BISECT(1)

NAME
       svn-bisect - Bisect Subversion revisions to find a regression

SYNOPSIS
       svn-bisect start [good_rev [bad_rev]]

       svn-bisect {good|bad} [rev]

       svn-bisect run command

       svn-bisect reset

       svn-bisect status

DESCRIPTION
       svn-bisect helps to automate finding a bug or behavior change in a Sub-
       version working copy.  Given an initial "good" revision, with  the  de-
       sired  or original behavior, and a newer "bad" revision, with the unde-
       sired or modified behavior, svn-bisect will do a binary search  through
       the revision range to find which revision caused the change.

       svn-bisect  must  be  initialized  in  a  working copy, with svn-bisect
       start.  It also needs to be given at least one good revision (the base-
       line) and one bad revision (known modified behavior) revision.

       Sub-commands:

       start  Initializes  or  reinitializes svn-bisect; optionally takes good
              and bad revision parameters.

       good rev

       bad rev
              Tells svn-bisect that a revision is good  or  bad,  defining  or
              narrowing the search space.  If not specified, revision defaults
              to the current revision in the working  copy.   svn-bisect  will
              then  update  to a revision halfway between the new good and bad
              boundaries.  If this update crosses a point where a  branch  was
              created, it switches in or out of the branch.

       reset  Resets the working copy to the revision and branch where svn-bi-
              sect start was run.  In the simple case this is equivalent to rm
              -r  .svn-bisect; svn update, but not if it has crossed branches,
              and not if you did not start at the HEAD revision.  In any case,
              svn-bisect  never  keeps track of mixed-revision working copies,
              so do not use svn-bisect in a working copy that will need to  be
              restored to mixed revisions.

       status Prints a brief status message.

       run command
              Runs  the  bisection  in  a loop.  You must have already defined
              initial  good  and  bad  boundary  conditions.   Each  iteration
              through the loop runs command as a shell command (a single argu-
              ment, quoted if necessary) on the chosen  revision,  then  marks
              the  revision  as  good or bad, based on the exit status of com-
              mand.

EXAMPLES
       Assume you are trying to find which  revision  between  1250  and  1400
       caused the make check command to fail.

           svn-bisect start 1250 1400
           svn-bisect run 'make check'
           svn-bisect reset

ENVIRONMENT
       SVN    The Subversion command-line program to call (default svn).

FILES
       .svn-bisect
              The directory containing state information, removed after a suc-
              cessful bisection.

SEE ALSO
       git-bisect(1).

AUTHOR
       Written by Robert Millan and Peter Samuelson, for  the  Debian  Project
       (but may be used by others).

                                  2009-10-22                     SVN-BISECT(1)