Introduction to Git and SVN 🔄

When you are writing code and deploying it into production without version control, you risk breaking your website without a way to roll back to the previous version. Version control has made life easier for a lot of developers and software companies. It allows you to deploy code into production with confidence after testing.

In the WordPress ecosystem, the most commonly used types of version control are Git and SVN.

Git is a distributed version control system that allows groups of people to work on the same code at the same time without overwriting each other’s changes.

Subversion, commonly abbreviated as SVN is a centralized software versioning and revision control system similar to Git.

Difference between Git and SVN

When you are using Git, all your files are stored in one central repository but you can have multiple local copies to work on whereas when you are working with SVN, all your files are stored in the central repository alone and you will have to commit your changes directly to it.

NOTE: GitHub offers a wide range of resources to help you get started with Git.

If you know how to work with Git already, you may feel SVN a bit different in how it works. But don’t let that stop you from learning how to use SVN because SVN is used commonly in the WordPress ecosystem for managing theme and plugin updates in the WordPress repository.

Now that you have got a basic understanding of what Git and SVN are, you should know how to write proper commit messages. It plays a very important role in software development. You can learn about it from here –

• How to Write a Git Commit Message
• Writing good commit messages

References

• Videos
• GitHub Cheat Sheet
• Git Cheat Sheet
• A Visual Git Reference
• Reference
• Oh Shit, Git!?!
• Understanding the GitHub Flow
• A successful Git branching model
• GitHub Help
• Git Command Explorer – Find the right commands you need without digging through the web.
• Roger Dudler’s Git Guide
• How to Write a Git Commit Message