Local:Using Bazaar bzr

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General

Bazaar is a distributed version control system (DVCS) actively developed on launchpad.

A main characteristic of distributed version control systems is that a branch is both a repository and a working copy and hence a first-class citizen. Each operation of a DVCS is executed in this local branch and does not require (network) access to the master repository.

It is also possible to have repositories without a working tree (roughly equal to a repository in SVN) and standalone working trees that are bound to a master repository (again similar to SVN).

Creating a branch

To initialize a branch (repository + working tree) in a folder, type

bzr init

If you want a repository only, type

bzr init --no-tree

Checking repository status

To see uncommitted changes, type

bzr status

Unlike SVN, this reports changes for the whole repository, not just the current folder. To get the status for the current folder type

bzr status .

and similar for any target folder

Committing changes

To commit (check in) changes, type

bzr commit

and your favorite (or default) editor will open for you to provide a log message

You can specify the log message on the command line via

bzr ci -m "<message>"

Branching

Branching in bzr is a no-brainer. To clone a branch (both its repository and working tree), type

bzr branch <source> <destination>

To checkout a working copy only that is bound to a repository (SVN style), use

bzr checkout <source> <destination>

Unlike SVN, it is not possible to check out / clone only parts of a branch since it is one unit in a DVCS.