Comments on: Why don’t people use version control?

By: Michael Mullin

Michael Mullin — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 19:15:36 +0000

“Teaching source control at the same time as say, pointers, may overwhelm some students.”

I have to disagree with you on this. I think VC can be taught in a single lab session, and can be used as a nice distration from the “tough stuff”

By: Jesse

Jesse — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 18:59:16 +0000

I’m not sure about you, but when I was in first semester, I had more time on my hands than I knew what to do with. I can understand experienced programmers not wanting to learn something new because “they don’t have time”, but students should be enthused to learn things like this. I sure would have been.

And as for #2, I’m surprised you didn’t mention a DVCS like Mercurial. I’ve been using Mercurial for some small pet projects and it is extremely easy to learn and use. Mercurial doesn’t have a “server” in the sense that you have to configure one before you can start using it.

A problem with this is the skill level of first semester students varies so widely. Some are bored, others have barely touched a computer. Teaching source control at the same time as say, pointers, may overwhelm some students. I also find it’s better to learn using “the dumb way” first, and then be corrected on the error of your ways as you go.

By: Michael Mullin

Michael Mullin — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:40:14 +0000

2) I disagree that this is an issue. You can run several vcs (version control systems) as a local user… In fact, I think SVN is supposed to be used locally && the networking support added on later

3) No real catastrophic detriment (yet) for not using it.

The main reason is that Students dont really see the NEED for using VC. They’ve never experienced the anguish of losing their code, and most modern IDEs have long CTRL+Z memories so they do not need to store their changes.

Now that I know the power of VC I think that this tool should be manditory for submission of semester 1 projects. Teachers should not get submissions from students in the traditional way anymore, but instead checkout the current version of the assignment when marking.