SVN-BISECT(1) General Commands Manual SVN-BISECT(1)
NAME
svn-bisect - Bisect Subversion revisions to find a regression
SYNOPSIS
svn-bisect start [good_rev [bad_rev]]
svn-bisect {good|bad} [rev]
svn-bisect run command
svn-bisect reset
svn-bisect status
DESCRIPTION
svn-bisect helps to automate finding a bug or behavior change in a Sub-
version working copy. Given an initial “good” revision, with the de-
sired or original behavior, and a newer “bad” revision, with the unde-
sired or modified behavior, svn-bisect will do a binary search through
the revision range to find which revision caused the change.
svn-bisect must be initialized in a working copy, with svn-bisect
start. It also needs to be given at least one good revision (the base-
line) and one bad revision (known modified behavior) revision.
Sub-commands:
start Initializes or reinitializes svn-bisect; optionally takes good
and bad revision parameters.
good rev
bad rev
Tells svn-bisect that a revision is good or bad, defining or
narrowing the search space. If not specified, revision defaults
to the current revision in the working copy. svn-bisect will
then update to a revision halfway between the new good and bad
boundaries. If this update crosses a point where a branch was
created, it switches in or out of the branch.
reset Resets the working copy to the revision and branch where svn-bi-
sect start was run. In the simple case this is equivalent to rm
-r .svn-bisect; svn update, but not if it has crossed branches,
and not if you did not start at the HEAD revision. In any case,
svn-bisect never keeps track of mixed-revision working copies,
so do not use svn-bisect in a working copy that will need to be
restored to mixed revisions.
status Prints a brief status message.
run command
Runs the bisection in a loop. You must have already defined
initial good and bad boundary conditions. Each iteration
through the loop runs command as a shell command (a single argu-
ment, quoted if necessary) on the chosen revision, then marks
the revision as good or bad, based on the exit status of com-
mand.
EXAMPLES
Assume you are trying to find which revision between 1250 and 1400
caused the make check command to fail.
svn-bisect start 1250 1400
svn-bisect run 'make check'
svn-bisect reset
ENVIRONMENT
SVN The Subversion command-line program to call (default svn).
FILES
.svn-bisect
The directory containing state information, removed after a suc-
cessful bisection.
SEE ALSO
git-bisect(1).
AUTHOR
Written by Robert Millan and Peter Samuelson, for the Debian Project
(but may be used by others).
2009-10-22 SVN-BISECT(1)
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