Debian Documentation Project SVN

The Debian Documentation Project stores its web pages and much of the manual text on the Debian Subversion server at svn.debian.org. svn.debian.org is part of the Gforge installation on alioth.debian.org. Please read the Alioth documentation for more information about how this service works.

Everybody can download the sources from the SVN server. Only members of the Debian Documentation Project can update files.

Accessing the sources in SVN

You can use a web interface to access the files individually and see changes to them at http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/ddp/manuals/trunk/

For downloading an entire manual, direct access to the SVN server is often a better option. You need the subversion package on your own machine.

Connecting anonymously (read-only) to the SVN server

Use this command to download all the files:

svn co svn://svn.debian.org/svn/ddp/manuals/trunk manuals

This will recursively create the directories and populate them.

To update your local copy with any changes made by other people, enter the manuals directory and run the command:

svn export --force svn://svn.debian.org/svn/ddp/manuals

Connecting to the SVN server, with update privileges (svn)

Before accessing the SVN server using this method you have to be granted write access to it first. Please read how to request update permission first.

Use this command to download all the files:

svn co svn+ssh://svn.debian.org/svn/ddp/manuals/trunk manuals

This will recursively create the directories and populate them.

To update your local copy with any changes made by other people, enter the manuals directory and run the command:

svn update

Connecting to the SVN server, with update privileges (git-svn)

Before accessing the SVN server using this method you have to be granted write access to it first. Please read how to request update permission first.

Use this command to download all the files:

git svn clone -s -rHEAD svn+ssh://svn.debian.org/svn/ddp/manuals manuals

This will recursively create the directories and populate them and also create a local git repository without older history which can track alioth SVN server.

To update your local copy with any changes made by other people, enter the manuals directory and run the command:

git svn rebase

Obtaining update privileges

Update privileges are available to anyone who wishes to participate in writing the manuals. We generally request that you have submitted a couple of useful patches first.

To obtain update privileges, you need to send a request to the Debian documentation mailing list. Please explain why you need access. Please indicate your Alioth login name. Once your request is approved, you'll be part of the ddp project (and Unix group) on Alioth.

Automatic update mechanism

The published web pages of the manual text are generated on www-master.debian.org as part of the regular web site rebuilding process, which happens every four hours.

The script does a svn export --force svn://svn.debian.org/svn/ddp/manuals, and then make -C trunk publish.

The makefile is set up to rebuild each subdirectory (that contains maintained documentation), and to install the files from each subdirectory in doc/manuals/ subdirectory of the web site. The subdirectory makefiles are derived from manuals/standard.makefile.

The documentation files generated by the update script can be found at http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/.

The log files generated by the update script can be found at http://www-master.debian.org/build-logs/ddp/

Note that this process regenerates the /doc/manuals/ directory. The contents of the /doc/ directory is generated either from webwml or from other scripts, such as those which extract certain manuals from their packages.