<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="no"?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /><title>The Subversion Repository, Defined</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="styles.css" type="text/css" /><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.73.2" /><link rel="start" href="index.html" title="Version Control with Subversion" /><link rel="up" href="svn.reposadmin.html" title="Chapter 5. Repository Administration" /><link rel="prev" href="svn.reposadmin.html" title="Chapter 5. Repository Administration" /><link rel="next" href="svn.reposadmin.planning.html" title="Strategies for Repository Deployment" /></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">The Subversion Repository, Defined</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="svn.reposadmin.html">Prev</a> </td><th width="60%" align="center">Chapter 5. Repository Administration</th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="svn.reposadmin.planning.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr /></div><div class="sect1" lang="en" xml:lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a id="svn.reposadmin.basics"></a>The Subversion Repository, Defined</h2></div></div></div><p>Before jumping into the broader topic of repository
administration, let's further define what a repository is. How
does it look? How does it feel? Does it take its tea hot or
iced, sweetened, and with lemon? As an administrator, you'll be
expected to understand the composition of a repository both from
a literal, OS-level perspective—how a repository looks and
acts with respect to non-Subversion tools—and from a
logical perspective—dealing with how data is represented
<span class="emphasis"><em>inside</em></span> the repository.</p><p>Seen through the eyes of a typical file browser application
(such as the Windows Explorer) or command-line based filesystem
navigation tools, the Subversion repository is just another
directory full of stuff. There are some subdirectories with
human-readable configuration files in them, some subdirectories
with some not-so-human-readable data files, and so on. As in
other areas of the Subversion design, modularity is given high
regard, and hierarchical organization is preferred to cluttered
chaos. So a shallow glance into a typical repository from a
nuts-and-bolts perspective is sufficient to reveal the basic
components of the repository:</p><pre class="screen">
$ ls repos
conf/ dav/ db/ format hooks/ locks/ README.txt
</pre><p>Here's a quick fly-by overview of what exactly you're seeing
in this directory listing. (Don't get bogged down in the
terminology—detailed coverage of these components exists
elsewhere in this and other chapters.)</p><div class="variablelist"><dl><dt><span class="term">conf</span></dt><dd><p>A directory containing repository configuration files.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">dav</span></dt><dd><p>A directory provided to mod_dav_svn for its private
housekeeping data.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">db</span></dt><dd><p>The data store for all of your versioned data.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">format</span></dt><dd><p>A file that contains a single integer that
indicates the version number of the repository layout.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">hooks</span></dt><dd><p>A directory full of hook script templates (and hook
scripts themselves, once you've installed some).</p></dd><dt><span class="term">locks</span></dt><dd><p>A directory for Subversion's repository lock
files, used for tracking accessors to the repository.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">README.txt</span></dt><dd><p>A file whose contents merely inform its readers that
they are looking at a Subversion repository.</p></dd></dl></div><p>Of course, when accessed via the Subversion libraries, this
otherwise unremarkable collection of files and directories
suddenly becomes an implementation of a virtual, versioned
filesystem, complete with customizable event triggers. This
filesystem has its own notions of directories and files, very
similar to the notions of such things held by real filesystems
(such as NTFS, FAT32, ext3, and so on). But this is a special
filesystem—it hangs these directories and files from
revisions, keeping all the changes you've ever made to them
safely stored and forever accessible. This is where the
entirety of your versioned data lives.</p></div><div class="navfooter"><hr /><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="svn.reposadmin.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="svn.reposadmin.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="svn.reposadmin.planning.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">Chapter 5. Repository Administration </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> Strategies for Repository Deployment</td></tr></table></div></body></html>
