NautilusSVN – The TortoiseSVN for Linux users
TortoiseSVN is the dominant Subversion client for Windows. While there so many Subversion clients available, what makes TortoiseSVN special is it’s smooth integration with the Windows Explorer. As a result, working with your Subversion repository becomes super easy. When I switched completely from Windows to Ubuntu Linux, TortoiseSVN is one of the few applications I missed. Not anymore!
As I mentioned earlier, NautilusSVN attempts to be the TortoiseSVN for Linux. It looks like NautilusSVN is not yet available in the Ubuntu repositories but fortunately they had a “deb” package which I downloaded.
Though their documentation specifies that you don’t need anything extra, I had to install a few packages before proceeding to NautilusSVN. I installed the dependencies using the following command,
sudo apt-get install python-nautilus python-svn python-configobj
Then I installed the “deb” package using the command,
sudo dpkg -i nautilussvn*.deb
I had to just close and open Nautilus to see NautilusSVN in action.
All other SVN tasks can be performed by simply doing a “right click” at appropriate places in your working copy.
NautilusSVN has a commit window quite similar to TortoiseSVN.
NautilusSVN provides decent support to create branch/tag, move, change properties, view revisions etc. But there is no “Repository Browser” yet and the “Revert” option needs more polish. Also I noticed that as my working copy grew, NautilusSVN seems to slow down Nautilus. This can be a major downside which might prevent the adoption of this otherwise great tool. But NautilusSVN is still in beta and I hope these issues will be resolved shortly.
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Looks cool. I am still sticking with my eclipse plugin though since that would work with Windows and linux
It’s a cool extension I have been using for a while. However, it’s still very slow when browsing folders. Personally this will get solved as soon as I receive my SSD but in general, it’s too slow when compared to other SVN solutions.
@Casper Bang
Yup, you are right! I perceive that might be the major stumbling block in the adoption of this otherwise great tool.
Yesterday the new RabbitVCS has been released and replaces the NautilusSVN project. The client seems to be much faster and (for me the most important feature) it loads the svn information without freezing nautilus. It loads the informatino in the background and displays a little clock instead of the status icons as long it is loading. We work with workingcopies with a few thousand files and for me it works (now) great.
@Jan
Jan,
Thanks for the info. Will have a look at RabbitVCS.