Have you been thinking of moving to subversion to manage your source code but don’t want to set up your own subversion server. Subversion has become a de facto standard among LabVIEW developers around the world as a source code control solution. Weather you are a lonely developer or leading a large group of developers, source code control hosting service might be the best solution for you. Using a managed subversion hosting service is cheap, and you don’t have to consume your valuable time in setting up and maintaining the subversion server.

There are several subversion hosting services out there. I’ve been using for the source code of my personal LabVIEW projects and other software projects service provider called ProjectLocker. For merely $2.50 a month ProjectLocker provides a managed subversion service for my projects as well as Trac issue management tool. This cheapest ProjectLocker service package is suitable for personal development projects but they also have bigger packages for larger groups. The price per user for all packages ranges from $1-$2,50 per month, which is hardly nothing compared to the value of having a managed source code control service together with an issue management service. ProjectLocker promised to offer ExpressionFlow readers the first 30 days free on a subscription to any of their services by entering “LABVIEW” in the Promotional Code field at signup.

If you have been hosting your personal subversion repository on your local hard drive, you should consider hosted subversion service. With local repository you are tied to a single computer. Hosted subversion service allows you to work from anywhere and from any computer on your projects. If your company is hosting its own subversion server, external subversion hosting could be a cost-effective and easy alternative. If you or your work group is not yet using source code control, you should no longer have any excuses. Source code control is a must have tool in professional LabVIEW development and using a subversion hosting service makes the first steps very easy.

Don’t forget our earlier article Using new LabVIEW Merge Tool LVMerge With TortoiseSVN. Also check ThinkingInG subversion resources.

EDIT: I found a comparison chart on subversion hosting providers. Don’t read the chart literally, as most providers do have multiple products and not all products are listed. Rather take it as a list of subversion hosting providers aand check yourself what kind of solutions they provide. Not that many subversion hosting companies provide services for open source projects only.