79 lines
4.8 KiB
Markdown
79 lines
4.8 KiB
Markdown
# Use with SCM
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Documentation of FoxBin2Prg - A Binary to Text converter for MS Visual Foxpro 9
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## Purpose of this document
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Using FoxPin2Prg with SCM.
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See [use with git](./FoxBin2Prg_git.md)
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The original document was created by [Fernando D. Bozzo](https://github.com/fdbozzo) whom I like to thank for the great project.
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Pictures are taken from the original project.
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As far as possible these are the original documents. Changes are added where functionality is changed.
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----
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## Table of contents
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- [Remark](#remark)
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- [A short mention on SourceSafe](#a-short-mention-on-sourcesafe)
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## Remark
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**This is article is a stub.**
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If you like to use this tool with non SCM tools like [_git_](git-scm.com/),
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have a look on [VFPX](https://vfpx.github.io/projects/), there are some that integrate _git_ and _FoxBin2Prg_ into VFP IDE.
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## A short mention on SourceSafe
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For those who keep using it, I recommend running away from it to any other modern SCM out there.
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Main reason is that Microsoft doesn't support it anymore,
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which last version was released in 2005 (Visual SourceSafe 2005, that many people didn't know of) and a lot of people keep using the version that came with Visual Studio 6, released in 1998! (more or less).
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(It was nice in the time there was nothing different on Win, in special not this tool.)
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It have a big scalability problem, doesn't guarantee the history integrity and it is not client-server,
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which is crucial on any modern SCM.
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It's simply too easy to mess with the history and delete files from it manually,
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or have a corrupted database because a number of reasons, as virus on some client PC,
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hardware problems or network problems, and in many cases this errors are irrecoverable.
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Try to run it on a cheap NAS, it's nothing then a pain.
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If, despite the warning, you have no other choice that keep using it,
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then you must know that FoxBin2Prg have integration with it,
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thanks to the configuration file foxbin2prg.cfg and the capability to change default extensions from tx2 to txa (sc2>sca, and so on).
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In fact you can merge binaries as you probably have never seen :-)
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----
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People that came from SourceSafe, often tends to think of SCM tools as repositories of code,
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because of the limitations everybody that used SourceSafe knows,
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but the reality is that a SCM tool is much more than a repository of code,
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using a SCM tool with FoxBin2Prg you:
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* Can Manage the life cycle of an application
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* Can compare the binaries, using prg-style representations, to know what have changed at any time in the history of the application
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* Can know who have changed what at a code line level
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* Can have various stats, as how many changes have been done between past release and this release, even by component
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* Can have a team of developers that can work on the same components (forms, classlibs, menus, etc) and can concurrently merge there code and get a functional binary of this merge without blocking each other
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* Can work on parallel versions (this release, next release, many releases, patches) using branches
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* I reapeat: You can use branches as other languages can do from many years, but FoxPro couldn't, up until now
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* Can have the option to develop in geographically distributed projects. This allows that you can work on your house and I in mine and we can share the repository, ie, using GitHub or BitBucket as intermediary
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* Can have the option to synchronize the source code repository with other repositories, for backup purposes or other reasons
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* Can have the option to "undo" a merge using a substractive-merge that affects various components, with safety
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* Can be free of privative formats and use something else that can be used with more than one SCM tool. SourceSafe is the only that understand SourceSafe, so you are a prisoner
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* In summary, you are in control of all aspects of a VFP system and there releases and changes
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This documentation is to help configure FoxBin2Prg with some modern SCM tools,
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beginning with the SCM tool I'm using (PlasticSCM) from middle 2013
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and that I personally think is the most advanced SCM tool y know until now.
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In this first quick-guide I will explain what is PlasticSCM,
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how to configure and how to begin working with Visual FoxPro 9 projects using branch-per-task.
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**Part of this guide can be used with any modern SCM tool, and over time I can add documentation or links for using FoxBin2Prg with other SCM tools.**
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If you already are using FoxBin2Prg with another SCM tool,
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feel free to share how you are using it so others can benefit.
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- [Using FoxBin2Prg with PlasticSCM](Using-FoxBin2Prg-with-PlasticSCM)
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----
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This project is part of [VFPX](https://vfpx.github.io/).
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----
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Last changed: _2021/03/03_  |