Source Control for Everyone? [closed]

Question

I've got a number of non-technical users that all share a set of project files. It would be ideal to have them using version control, but I think that both subversion and git are too technical for non-technical office staff.

Is there any distributed source control software that would work well for normal people?

Answer 1

If source control is too technical they can use Subversion with WebDav.

The less technical people will just save files normally from whatever application they use, without worrying/thinking about source control. They get the benefit of auto-versioning without doing anything.

When ever they need more functionality they can learn to use TortoiseSVN to view diffs, revert to old version that were made automatically for them etc...

From the subversion book :

Because so many operating systems already have integrated WebDAV clients, the use case for this feature borders on fantastical: imagine an office of ordinary users running Microsoft Windows or Mac OS. Each user “mounts” the Subversion repository, which appears to be an ordinary network folder. They use the shared folder as they always do: open files, edit them, save them. Meanwhile, the server is automatically versioning everything. Any administrator (or knowledgeable user) can still use a Subversion client to search history and retrieve older versions of data.

Answer 2

Have you tried Tortoise SVN? I can't imagine source control getting much easier to use.

Answer 3

This sounds more like a use case for a collaborative tool like BaseCamp, SpiceBird, or SharePoint than "source control." Those tools have the same aim as source control but are more geared toward Word Document type stuff and the corresponding users. It's one more item for the IT folks to maintain on the server but it also removes the possibility of someone's assistant wiping out your code.

Answer 4

If they only need to edit Office files one user at a time infrequently, get the files on a network share with appropriate permissions and back them up nightly. Active Directory will warn them if someone already has it open.

If it's more complicated than just office consider Sharepoint. I think SVN is too complicated especially since conflicts and comparisons of binary files e.g. old word docs doesn't work really.