digitalBush

At work we've been using Visual Sourcesafe for nearly 4 years now.  We're a small operation of 3 developers, so it hasn't been too much of an issue.  There have been some pain points, but as a whole things have gone okay with the process.  The reason why this has worked is that most projects were internal and everyone ran the latest bits.  For us, source control was more of a history of what we had changed and when.

Even though we're a small operation, that's no excuse for using a sucky source control product.  While sourcesafe has been okay for our past needs, our current projects are in dire need of a source control upgrade.  The sticking point with sourcesafe was long running projects to overhaul existing software.  Branching and merging in sourcesafe was just too painful (read that as unusuable).  We can't really afford to be making changes to the trunk that make us unable to release bug fixes for a month or two.

Hello Subversion!  We decided to try out Subversion for an application that fit the criteria above.  It's an established project that needs a serious revision to it which was scheduled to take one month.  This project is central to our company's processes, so interim bug fixes are a must.  The project is almost finished and here's what happened with our trial run.  As expected, an "immediate need" fix was requested while we had the application in shambles for the next major update.  We were able to change that code in the trunk and then merge that change with the branch.  The whole process was so effortless that I don't think I can ever look back to sourcesafe.  

I'm officially sold.  The switch to Subversion will be free except for our time.  Subversion is free and VisualSVN Server makes it a snap to setup and integrate into our currect domain.  TortoiseSVN and AnkhSVN handle our client needs and Visual Studio integration.  If you are a sourcesafe user, run (don't walk) away!  The grass is greaner on the other side.