CvsGraph A CVS/RCS repository grapher

• Introduction
• Where to get it
• CvsGraph in action
• An example
• More information
• License
• FAQ
• Bugs
• Changes
• Links and others
• Acknowledgements
• Important mailnote

Introduction

Where to get it

• Automake is used from version 1.7.0. There can still be problems. Please let me know if you run into problems.
• CVSNT is supported as of version 1.5.1, including mergepoints. Please report any stability problems and errors.
• I no longer build/provide rpm packages as of version 1.6.1. Fedora supplies its own binaries in the 'extras' repository. Also, most Linux distros have a prepackaged version available. You are encouraged to use those packages for your convenience and automatic update purposes.

CvsGraph in action

ViewVC with CvsGraph

Notes from Jene Jasper:
Just finished creating an update of the patch for ViewVC 1.0.4. Included a diff and txt (with Windows style path for GnuWin32: patch -i viewvc-1.0.4-cvsgraph-1.6.1.txt -p 0 [--dry-run] --verbose) file. Also changed the patch a bit:

• the default setting takes effect again, when the user selects a new cvsgraph_href
• reformatted the table into a 4 column setup instead of the 2 column one
• footer changed to contain a reference to CvsGraph next to ViewVC
• view.conf is also patched the same way as view.conf.dist to be able to run the patch on an existing configuration that wasn't dramatically changed from the distribution version

• add options in the graph display page:
  • upside-down display
  • add/remove an extra branchbox at the end of the trunk
  • left-to-right and right-to-left display
  • strip untagged revisions
  • user settable limit on maximum tags displayed
• viewcvs.conf option cvsgraph_useropt to control the visibility of above options
• viewcvs.conf option cvsgraph_opt to set the defaults of above options
• cvsgraph.conf branch_tag_* options to set proper defaults to the new options
• cvsgraph.conf add default transparent background
• cvsgraph.conf add merge_* options for merge display
• cvsgraph.conf add branch_fold* options to fold emtpy branches in one box

	$ tar zxf /path/to/tarball/viewcvs-0.9.2.tar.gz
	$ cd viewcvs-0.9.2
	$ zcat /path/to/diff/viewcvs-0.9.2-cvsgraph-1.4.0.diff.gz | patch -p0
		# (use other diff for 1.0-dev branch)
	$ ./viewcvs-install

CvsWeb with CvsGraph

An example

./cvsgraph -O'merge_from="^source_(.*)"; merge_to="^merge_%1$"; merge_color="#e00000"' \
	-O'merge_from="^source2_(.*)"; merge_to="^merge2_%1$"; merge_color="#00e000"' \
	-O'strip_untagged=1; strip_first_rev=0; transparent_bg=1' \
	-o ../t.png -r. -m. ../t.c,v

More info

• The README
• The ChangeLog
• The manpage cvsgraph(1)
• The manpage cvsgraph.conf(5)

FAQ

1. I get the error "cvsgraph.c:52: #error No image output format available. Check libgd" when running make
   This is caused by libgd missing vital libraries. Please check config.log for the details of which library is missing. Then add a --with-xxx-lib=yyy to configure. Rerunning configure means that you might want to run 'make distclean' first, or remove the cache file to make sure that everything is checked.
   Most often this happens on systems where you have libgd compiled as a static library (manual installed libgd and associate libraries).
   If you know how to write proper autoconf checks, then please send me a patch, or tell me how to do it.
2. I get lex errors "lex: illegal option -- 8"
   This is because you need to use flex. Get it from a GNU mirror near you.
3. I get lex errors "rcsl.l", line xx: undefined symbol: rcslval"
   This is because you need to use bison. Get it from a GNU mirror near you.
4. I get errors translating/compiling file rcsy.y
   This is because you need bison. Get it from a GNU mirror near you (byacc might work, but I do not support it).
5. cvsgraph and/or configure can't find all (dynamic) libraries
   This seems to be a major problem on SunOS and the like. You need to check the library-path to include /usr/local/lib because many libraries end up there.
   For SunOS 5.9 you can do something like: crle -l "/usr/lib:/usr/local/lib"
   Can someone please send a patch for configure.in so that detection works?
   Also, please check the /etc/ld.so.conf file on Linux and check if the webserver (in conjunction with viewcvs) adds/strips a LD_LIBRARY_PATH or setting.
6. Does CvsGraph support Subversion?
   No, no and no. Subversion is a no go because they have trashed the tree-structure of branching by making the repository a copy database. Not even tags are real, but copies of files. A quote from the subversion mailing list (alt link):

   > Does CVSGraph version 1.5.0 support subversion repositories when used with
   > development version of ViewCVS?
   
   The basic problem that cvsgraph solves for CVS (full history tree browsing) is at best untenable, and worst impossible, in Subversion right now (due to the design of the repository). This is a problem we aim to solve (in Subversion) in the relatively near future.

7. I get no image in ViewVC/ViewCVS but see a Python Exception
   You probably see something similar like:

   exec failed:
    cvsgraph -i -c /.../cvsgraph.conf -r /yyy -x x -3 ... <and a lot more parameters>.... yyy/file.c,v
   Content-Type: text/html
   
   An Exception Has Occurred
   Python Traceback
   Traceback (most recent call last):
     File "/.../lib/viewvc.py", line 3611, in main
       request.run_viewvc()
     File "/.../lib/viewvc.py", line 388, in run_viewvc
       self.view_func(self)
     File "/.../lib/viewvc.py", line 2226, in
   view_cvsgraph
       rcsfile), 'rb', 0)
     File "/.../lib/popen.py", line 125, in popen
       os.execvp(cmd, (cmd,) + tuple(args))
     File "/.../usr/lib/python2.2/os.py", line
   299, in execvp
       _execvpe(file, args)
     File "/.../usr/lib/python2.2/os.py", line
   337, in _execvpe
       apply(func, (fullname,) + argrest)
   OSError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory [emphasis added]
   

   The problem is that the cvsgraph executable cannot be run because it is not found. This is most of the time because you have misconfigured the option cvsgraph_path in the viewcvs.conf file. Please check that you have a trailing '/' in the path and that no leading or trailing whitespace is on that line.

License

Bugs

• Images can still be very large when you have many revisions and branches. You can reduce imagesize by using any combination of these options:

  strip_untagged	Reduce the number of revisions shown that have no tags
  strip_first_rev
  rev_maxtags	Reduce revision boxes by limiting the number of tags shown
  tag_ignore	Remove tags that match a regular expression
  rev_hidenumber	Do not display the revision number in revision boxes
  branch_fold	Fold all branches without revisions into one branch-box
  branch_foldall
  branch_subtree	Only show parts of the tree

Changes

Changes for 1.7.0

• Do a better job at drawing the merge lines by selecting the shortest path from the revision boxes. An analysis is now done whether the source and destinations should be on the left or right side.
• Fix the left_right case for merge lines to display correctly.
• Fix a +/-1 error on the merge lines to account for both rounding errors and the shadow of the revision boxes.
• Add configuration option 'merge_on_tag' to force the left_right case to display merge lines on the tags instead of on the top/bottom sides. This also solves imagemap overlaps where multiple sources or destinations would be displayed at the same position.
• Fix the imagemap function to record the correct position of the merges.
• Use automake
• Streamline the package with patches from the Fedora RPMS

Changes for 1.6.2

• Imagemap bugfix
• Never released

Changes for 1.6.1

• Minor textual fixes in the config manual page
• Do a better job at drawing merge lines. Ugly cross over lines could be generated if branches had the same parent. Now they are moved to the right (or bottom)

Changes for 1.6.0

• Fix all numeric author ID
• Changed acceptable mail policy. See below in this file
• Fix incomplete parsing of access keyword in rcsfile
• Fix missing branch_bgcolor in manpage
• Fix author names with spaces but not in @ encapsulation
• Added multiple merge_{from,to,color} matching. Now several regex combinations are allowed to run concurrently.
• Added dynamic colors and strings for more flexibility in visual representations of the tree.
• Added keyword rev_idtext to define the revision ID in a revision box. Normally this would show the revision number, but can now be changed dynamically.
• Fix dashed lines when stripped revisions have mergepoints attatched

Changes for 1.5.2

• Fix POSIX compliance in timezone handling. Only putenv() is used now.
• Fix branch-count when branches get folded.
• Fix configure script to detect gd-2 problems (Thanks to Russell Yanofsky)
• Work around CVSNT wrong keyword ordering breaking rcsfile(5) ordering
• Fix complaining about a new CVSNT keyword properties
• Fix mergepoint1 syntax used by CVSNT allowing revision numbers as argument
• Fix merge lines to untagged revisions when strip_untagged is active

Changes for 1.5.1

• Added patch from Henrik Carlqvist
  • added option rev_hidenumber for disabling revision number display.
  • added option tag_ignore_merge for disabling merge_from/merge_to display if matched with tag_ignore.
  • added resorting of branches on how many revisions they have. This saves space under circumstances.
• Added option merge_findall so that merge_from/merge_to tags can have multiple matches.
• Added the patches supplied by Ville Skyttä
  • fixed spelling in the manpages and config file
  • fixed & -> & problem in config
  • fixed generics in wrapper example
• Added a fix for the zimezone problem as suggested by Henrik Carlqvist by using the environment.
• Fixed a bug in the detection of branch-numbers in the logical ,v file structure (reported by Daniel Dumitrache). The branch was deduced from the revision, but that would fail for revision numbers that are like magic branch-numbers (x.x.0.x) because they were interpreted. These revision numbers are now correctly handled.
• Added patch from Gordon Hollingworth to use mergepoints as implemented by CVSNT. Adapted the patch to enable both tag-detected merges and mergepoints to be shows at the same time.
• Changed the warning behaviour so that known CVS/CVSNT extension phrases don't generate warning messages that mess up the generated image.
• Implemented selection of png compression level with image_compress and enable interlacing (progressive load) for both png and jpeg images with image_interlace.

Changes for 1.5.0

• Add regex method for ignoring tags in the generation of the graph. Old trees are overpolulated and this is a way to reduce it even further. New config options tag_ignore, tag_nocase and tag_negate.
• Added drawing of partial trees. You now can select a subtree based on a revision number, branch number or symbolic tag to show only that part of the tree. New config option branch_subtree selects which part is shown. If the subtree is empty, then the whole tree is shown.
• Most error and warning messages are now displayed in the graph, instead of being written to stderr. This enables you to see an image eventhough errors might be present. The old method would generate a corrupt image. New configuration options include msg_color and msg_font to control the looks of it. Messages are always printed at the bottom of the image.
• Fixed a bug in the folding code where subtrees would not fold correctly.
• Added diff links in the map-generation for detected merges so that you can get the differences in merge-operations. The options map_merge_href and map_merge_alt must be set accordingly.

Pre 1.5.0 changes

• These are now moved to another page to make it more compact.

Links

• I just learned that there is another program that can make graphs of a cvs repository, called boneclipse-cvsgrapher which is at http://www.bonevich.com/boneclipse-master/boneclipse-cvsgrapher/index.html.
  It uses the Eclipse framework/IDE.
• WinCvs was the inspiration of the grapher.
• Just for the fun of it... Look at this link. I have no clue how to read it, but it makes me kinda proud:-)

Acknowledgements

• Many thanks to Jason Corley for the RPM spec-file
• Thanks to Russell Yanofsky and Chris Bridges (cvsgraph at rfel dot com) for the windows binaries.
  Please see http://www.cvsnt.org/wiki/CvsGraphMingw for details if you want to compile a windows binary. I do not know anything about it.
• Thanks to all others who contributed bugreports and patches which I probably have mentioned in a log or other places. Mail me if your ego is big enough to want a place on the frontpage ;-)
• * The icon used is shamelessly taken from the ViewCVS distro, file cvsgraph_16x16.png. I cannot find any reference to the original creator, otherwise I would gladly credit him or her personally.

Mailnote

• legal notice or threat(s)
• disclosure restriction(s)
• forward restriction(s)
• "intended recipient" nonsense