Why use code versioning

Regardless of what they are called, or which system is used, the primary benefits you should expect from version control are as follows. A complete long-term change history of every file. This means every change made by many individuals over the years. Changes include the creation and deletion of files as well as edits to their contents.

Different VCS tools differ on how well they handle renaming and moving of files. This history should also include the author, date and written notes on the purpose of each change.

Having the complete history enables going back to previous versions to help in root cause analysis for bugs and it is crucial when needing to fix problems in older versions of software. If the software is being actively worked on, almost everything can be considered an "older version" of the software.

Branching and merging. Having team members work concurrently is a no-brainer, but even individuals working on their own can benefit from the ability to work on independent streams of changes. Creating a "branch" in VCS tools keeps multiple streams of work independent from each other while also providing the facility to merge that work back together, enabling developers to verify that the changes on each branch do not conflict.

Many software teams adopt a practice of branching for each feature or perhaps branching for each release, or both. There are many different workflows that teams can choose from when they decide how to make use of branching and merging facilities in VCS.

Being able to trace each change made to the software and connect it to project management and bug tracking software such as Jira , and being able to annotate each change with a message describing the purpose and intent of the change can help not only with root cause analysis and other forensics.

Having the annotated history of the code at your fingertips when you are reading the code, trying to understand what it is doing and why it is so designed can enable developers to make correct and harmonious changes that are in accord with the intended long-term design of the system.

This can be especially important for working effectively with legacy code and is crucial in enabling developers to estimate future work with any accuracy. While it is possible to develop software without using any version control, doing so subjects the project to a huge risk that no professional team would be advised to accept. So the question is not whether to use version control but which version control system to use.

There are many choices, but here we are going to focus on just one, Git. Learn more about other types of version control software. Learn about code review in Bitbucket Cloud Create a repository Clone and make a change on a new branch If you're using command line If you're using Sourcetree Create a pull request to merge your change. Learn branching in Bitbucket Cloud Get set up Review branching workflow.

Learn undoing changes with Bitbucket Cloud git status git log git reset git revert. Beginner What is version control Benefits of version control. Source Code Management. Why Git for your Organization Git for developers Git for marketing Git for product management Git for designers Git for customer support Git for human resources Git for anyone managing a budget.

Git SSH. Git archive. Git Cheatsheet. Getting Started Setting up a repository git init git clone git config git alias. It lets you split your code into two "paths" e. It is I am encountering objections, at this relative late date, to using Git; objections I see some raising here. This discussion has clarified greatly the imperative of using source control rather than simply making named back-up copies.

One key point is source control use even where we've single developer projects. Nobody is perfect. You make mistakes. If you're exceptionally good and smart you're going to be developing more complex apps; but you're still gonna make some mistakes and this handles it. Geez oh Pete!

I never use Linux but I think we all respect the great technical intelligence of Linus Torvalds. He recognized the importance of source control and he made key contributions to the inception of Git. That's a summary point for all the reasons given here. Torvalds gets it: source control is very important: use source control. Thanks to all who've commented on this long running topic.

Stack Overflow for Teams — Collaborate and share knowledge with a private group. Create a free Team What is Teams? Collectives on Stack Overflow. Learn more. Why should I use version control? Asked 12 years, 2 months ago. Active 2 years, 1 month ago. Viewed 58k times. Improve this question.

Robert Harvey k 44 44 gold badges silver badges bronze badges. JasonDavis JasonDavis It is a strange phenomenon that many developers usually early in their careers hold this view, and it's only when you force them to use source-control that the benefits start to unravel in their heads.

Hands up who doesn't share Martinho's shame. Somebody show TimEckel a bisection, where version control magically points you at a three line change from three months ago and says "the bug was introduced here.

TimEckel , you are still using a version control, another type with less features. Show 8 more comments. Active Oldest Votes. Have you ever: Made a change to code, realised it was a mistake and wanted to revert back? Lost code or had a backup that was too old? Had to maintain multiple versions of a product?

Wanted to see the difference between two or more versions of your code? Wanted to prove that a particular change broke or fixed a piece of code? Wanted to review the history of some code? Wanted to submit a change to someone else's code?

Wanted to share your code, or let other people work on your code? Wanted to see how much work is being done, and where, when and by whom? Wanted to experiment with a new feature without interfering with working code? In these cases, and no doubt others, a version control system should make your life easier. To misquote a friend: A civilised tool for a civilised age. Improve this answer. This guy has nailed it. Even when I work on projects alone, I prefer to have some version control running.

Perforce's fully-functioning demo for 2 users is great for that. Good points. However, note that version control is not a backup!

Couldn't agree more sleske. That's why along with our standard VM backup and nightly repository verification, I keep a mirror repository which is synced hourly and is also backed up and verified : We use Subversion and have found svnedge to be a good product. Hi Tim, how do you track your change history? How do you link your change history to an issue tracker or release notes? How do you manage merging different branches of your code? How do you find the changes you made in your last versions?

Maybe if you code alone, or never worry about why you changed code, then maybe just having a backup is enough, but I bet once you used a decent VCS you will understand why so many people use them.

Show 3 more comments. Even if you work alone you can benefit from source control. Among others, for these reasons: You don't lose anything. You can experiment at will. If it doesn't solve the problem, revert it. Simply cd to your code directory and run: git init Welcome to the club.

Martinho Fernandes R. Martinho Fernandes k 68 68 gold badges silver badges bronze badges. Regardless of the VCS you use, you can have it on a server and still not have it public useful for transferring between computers, and providing another backup - search for "private repository". Add a comment.

Robert Venables Robert Venables 5, 1 1 gold badge 21 21 silver badges 35 35 bronze badges. It does sound very useful and my current project is somewhat large, at least files, how does this work, i hear "version" doe that mean like version 1 and version 2, if the number increments, what if I modify 1 file and not the rest, will I have copies of unmodified code or just copies of file that are modified?

Only the delta of your changes is stored, so if you change one line in one file, that is all that will be stored at that version. A file in version control can be thought of as the sum of all its changes — spender. I have traveled through time to correct the comment above me: version control does not necessarily only store the delta, but it represents the version as a delta. Ed Schembor Ed Schembor 7, 7 7 gold badges 29 29 silver badges 37 37 bronze badges.

Or, I just pull the latest version from my backups that are created every time I save a file. TimEckel and some other people just revert their changes : — Abhinav Gauniyal. Here's a scenario that may illustrate the usefulness of source control even if you work alone.

The above scenario shows that source control can be a great tool, even if you work solo. You can use branches to work on longer-term tasks and then merge the branch back into the main line when it's done.

You can compare whole sets of files to other branches or to past revisions to see what's different. You can track work over time which is great for reporting and invoicing by the way. You can recover any revision of any file based on date or on a milestone that you defined.

Original author: Bill Karwin. It's like having a giant "undo" button all the way back to your first line of code. For this system to work, you first need to declare a public API. This may consist of documentation or be enforced by the code itself.

Regardless, it is important that this API be clear and precise. Once you identify your public API, you communicate changes to it with specific increments to your version number. Consider a version format of X. Z Major. This API could be declared in the code itself or exist strictly in documentation. X is the major version, Y is the minor version, and Z is the patch version.

Each element MUST increase numerically. For instance: 1. Any modifications MUST be released as a new version. Major version zero 0. Anything MAY change at any time. Version 1. The way in which the version number is incremented after this release is dependent on this public API and how it changes. Patch version Z x.

A bug fix is defined as an internal change that fixes incorrect behavior. Minor version Y x. It MAY be incremented if substantial new functionality or improvements are introduced within the private code. It MAY include patch level changes. Patch version MUST be reset to 0 when minor version is incremented.

Major version X X. It MAY also include minor and patch level changes. Patch and minor versions MUST be reset to 0 when major version is incremented. A pre-release version MAY be denoted by appending a hyphen and a series of dot separated identifiers immediately following the patch version.

Pre-release versions have a lower precedence than the associated normal version. A pre-release version indicates that the version is unstable and might not satisfy the intended compatibility requirements as denoted by its associated normal version. Examples: 1.