Can't see contents of a file deleted from Subversion repository

Question

A while ago I deleted a file from Subversion repository and now I want to take a look at its contents. I determined that the file was deleted in revision 68, so I tried the following:

svn cat -r 67 path/to/file

from the project root directory, svn tells me that svn: E155010: The node '/absolute/path/to/file' was not found. Then I tried:

 svn list -r 67 path/to

and Subversion clearly shows the file in the directory. So what am I missing?

I tried the answer from examining history of deleted file and it isn't working for me.

Answer 1

Try using peg instead operative revision:

svn cat http://server/svn/project/file@67

Short answer why it works in case of deleted files you can find in SO thread you have already mentioned:

When you want to look at old files you really should know the difference between:

svn cat http://server/svn/project/file -r 1234

and

svn cat http://server/svn/project/file@1234

The first version looks at the path that is now available as http://server/svn/project/file and retrieves that file as it was in revision 1234. (So this syntax does not work after a file delete).

The second syntax gets the file that was available as http://server/svn/project/file in revision 1234. So this syntax DOES work on deleted files.

Longer answer is in the SVN book: Peg and Operative Revisions.