RCS info wanted

[Jonathan I. Kamens]

In article <AMIR.91Mar14144117 at pilat.Israel.Silvaco.COM>, amir at pilat.Israel.Silvaco.COM (Amir J. Katz (Xpert)) writes:
|> There is an alternative to SCCS, called RCS (Revision Control System).
|> Questions:
|> 1. Is this a commercial product or public domain ?

  It is distributed by the Free Software Foundation under the GNU Public
License, which means that it is not public domain, but it is freely
redistributable as long as long as you meet the conditions of the GPL (which
is, basically, that you give the sources for it to anyone who asks and that
you send any changes you make back to the authors; but don't take my word for
it, read the GPL).

|> 2. Where can I get more information about RCS ?

  Anonymous ftp to prep.ai.mit.edu and grab the file /pub/gnu/rcs-5.5.tar.Z.

|> 3. Is it better than SCCS ? If so, why ?

  This is a recurring debate on the net.  Which one is better is pretty much a
matter of personal opinion, so your best bet is to grab the RCS sources and
take a look at them and decide for yourself.

  One of the biggest differences between the two (in my opinion) is that the
basic SCCS commands are very primitive and almost impossible for the user to
"just use" -- you almost certainly need some sort of front-end in order to use
SCCS effectively.  RCS, on the other hand, has useful utilities that can be
used by the user without any front-end (which isn't to say that front-ends for
RCS don't exist; they do, for example CVS, which is also distributed by the
FSF).

-- 
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