Using Subversion for NetBeans on Windows XP

Any programmer by now knows the value of having a source versioning and change management facility. A day comes when you mess up existing programs or lose your work, and that's where you can check out the latest working version from a repository somewhere. Beyond that, other benefits of using SCM include source code control and configuration management.
Because of simplicity and cost (free), I decided to use Subversion as the SCM solution. Subversion is designed to replace CVS, which I've had some trouble with. My latest aggravation comes from CVS's popular error message "cvs [server aborted]: Couldn't chdir to working directory : Invalid argument" (2.0.51d). Rather than try to resolve the issue, I decided it was time to find another solution, thus Subversion.

We've come to a point in development where we are making a lot of changes to the timecard utility. In order to preserve all our work, we should start checking it into a repository. This will also allow us to branch the application and merge changes from various contributors.
Here's the process for installing Subversion n Windows XP and to use it in NetBeans 6.0 (M10).

1. Download Subversion from http://subversion.tigris.org/project_packages.html. Choose the binary executables under the Windows section. I'm using version 1.4.4.
   
2. Run the executable and note the install directory (C:\Program Files\Subversion).
3. Add environment variables: SVN_EDITOR = C:\Windows\notepad.exe (to use Notepad as the log editor), and to PATH += C:\Program Files\Subversion\bin (NetBeans needs this).
4. Create a database directory that'll hold your versioned projects (J:\Subversion). Use the usual Windows Explorer for this.
5. I want all my NetBeans projects to be versioned under the NetBeans directory in the SVN database. So we create a repository as such - at command prompt, svnadmin create "J:\Subversion\NetBeans". A directory should appear under your SVN database (#4).
6. The repository in #5 above has a conf directory. Open the svnserv.conf and uncomment anon-access = read, auth-access = write, and password-db = passwd. Save that file.
   
7. Open the passwd file with a text editor and add a user under [users] in the form username = password. Save the file.
8. Create a windows service for SVN: at the command prompt, run sc create svnserver binPath= "\"C:\Program Files\Subversion\bin\svnserve.exe\" --service --root J:\Subversion --listen-port=6043 --listen-host=localhost" DisplayName= "Subversion Repository" depend= Tcpip. Startup is manual, so visit the Services applet and set how you want it to start, and start it.

In NetBeans, import the project into SVN:

1. Right-click the project -> Versioning | Import Into SVN Repository ...; repository url = svn://localhost:6043/NetBeans, enter the username and password specified earlier. [Next].
2. Repository folder defaults to the project folder name. I'd leave it like that. [Finish].
   

That's all! At the completion of each task, you should check your work in. If multiple developers work on the project, synchronize your local workspace with the latest from SVN.