Version Control Systems

Writing good code is a challenge. Everyone makes mistakes. ​Version Control Systems (VCS) were invented to limit the repercussions of our omnipresent coding mistakes. While using a VCS, whenever you make changes to your sourcecode, you "check in" those changes, which essentially makes a new version of the code. However, if you later discover a bug or want to remove an old addition, it is very easy to undo those changes, or any past changes by going to previous versions of the code with one or two commands. VCS are particularly important when you're building large applications or working with multiple programmers.

Popular VCS programs are:

​CVS

Very old and not generally good for distributed projects. Not recommended.

​Subversion

Has widespread adoption, but still a few problems with distributed projects.

​Git

Linux Torvalds wrote it!

​Mercurial

Excellent program. Easy to set up and use, and works well with distributed projects. There is an excellent (and entertaining) tutorial available at ​Hg Inits. You can download the software ​here. Recommended by Cameron.

Added by Cameron.