ViewVC (formerly ViewCVS) is an

open-source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...

tool for viewing the contents of CVS and SVN repositories using a

web browser A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used on ...

. It allows looking at specific revisions of files as well as side-by-side

diff In computing, the utility diff is a data comparison tool that computes and displays the differences between the contents of files. Unlike edit distance notions used for other purposes, diff is line-oriented rather than character-oriented, but it ...

s of different revisions. It is written in

Python Python may refer to: Snakes * Pythonidae, a family of nonvenomous snakes found in Africa, Asia, and Australia ** ''Python'' (genus), a genus of Pythonidae found in Africa and Asia * Python (mythology), a mythical serpent Computing * Python (pro ...

and the view parameters can be modified directly in a URL using a

REST Rest or REST may refer to: Relief from activity * Sleep ** Bed rest * Kneeling * Lying (position) * Sitting * Squatting position Structural support * Structural support ** Rest (cue sports) ** Armrest ** Headrest ** Footrest Arts and entert ...

style interface.

History

ViewVC was inspired by th
CVSweb
application, an older web-based CVS repository viewer written in

Perl Perl is a family of two high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming languages. "Perl" refers to Perl 5, but from 2000 to 2019 it also referred to its redesigned "sister language", Perl 6, before the latter's name was offici ...

. The original ViewCVS was a Python port of this application, with the intention to add enhancements to the existing functionality. In 2001, the project was moved to

SourceForge SourceForge is a web service that offers software consumers a centralized online location to control and manage open-source software projects and research business software. It provides source code repository hosting, bug tracking, mirrorin ...

and is currently part of the SourceForge infrastructure as it is the repository browser used by the site. One of the enhancements made was the ability to browse

Subversion Subversion () refers to a process by which the values and principles of a system in place are contradicted or reversed in an attempt to transform the established social order and its structures of power, authority, hierarchy, and social norms. Sub ...

repositories. The eventual maturity of this support meant that the name "ViewCVS" was no longer appropriate, which, combined with SourceForge's lack of support for Subversion at the time, led to the project being renamed "ViewVC" and moving to tigris.org. This name change and migration occurred in late 2005.

Developers

Some of the people involved with the development of ViewVC are: *

Greg Stein Greg Stein (born March 16, 1967 in Portland, Oregon), living in Austin, Texas, United States, is a programmer, speaker, sometime standards architect, and open-source software advocate, appearing frequently at conferences and in interviews on th ...

Jay Painter A jay is a member of a number of species of medium-sized, usually colorful and noisy, passerine birds in the Crow family, Corvidae. The evolutionary relationships between the jays and the magpies are rather complex. For example, the Eurasian m ...

* Tanaka Akira * Tim Cera * Peter Funk *

Lucas Bruand Lucas or LUCAS may refer to: People * Lucas (surname) * Lucas (given name) Arts and entertainment * Luca Family Singers, also known as "lucas ligner en torsk" * ''Lucas'' (album) (2007), an album by Skeletons and the Kings of All Cities * ''Luc ...

* C. Michael Pilato *

Russell Yanofsky Russell may refer to: People * Russell (given name) * Russell (surname) * Lady Russell (disambiguation) * Lord Russell (disambiguation) Places Australia * Russell, Australian Capital Territory * Russell Island, Queensland (disambiguation) ** ...

James Henstridge James is a common English language surname and given name: *James (name), the typically masculine first name James * James (surname), various people with the last name James James or James City may also refer to: People * King James (disambiguat ...

Components

ViewVC consists of two main components. The first part is the repository browser. The second part is the commit database.

Complementary software

* cvsgraph - allows graphical display of the branches and tags associated with a file in the repository. *

GNU GNU () is an extensive collection of free software (383 packages as of January 2022), which can be used as an operating system or can be used in parts with other operating systems. The use of the completed GNU tools led to the family of operat ...

enscript enscript is the name of a computer program originally written by Adobe in the late 1980s that converts text files to PostScript for printing. It has been re-implemented by many parties, including GNU and SPARC. The GNU version is released un ...

- allows

syntax highlighting Syntax highlighting is a feature of text editors that are used for programming, scripting, or markup languages, such as HTML. The feature displays text, especially source code, in different colours and fonts according to the category of terms ...

of ViewVC output. *

MySQL MySQL () is an open-source relational database management system (RDBMS). Its name is a combination of "My", the name of co-founder Michael Widenius's daughter My, and "SQL", the acronym for Structured Query Language. A relational database o ...

- for the commit database. * Pygments - Needed for syntax highlighting in versioned file contents displays.

External links

ViewVC website

ViewVC on GitHub

CVSGrab
- Reads a CVS repository via the ViewCVS web interface. (Useful for getting through a corporate firewall, where access to the pserver is not possible.)
SVN::Web
A Perl-based software that provides functionality similar to ViewVC. Concurrent Versions System Apache Subversion Free software programmed in Python {{programming-software-stub

History

Developers

Components

Complementary software

See also

External links