How to Set Up SVN for Email Notifications on Checkins

Keeping track of the work done by your team members in a codebase can often be a challenging task, especially in large projects. One effective way to stay updated on all changes is to receive email notifications each time someone checks in (commits) their code into the repository. If you’re using Subversion (SVN) as your version control system, you’re in luck! This guide will walk you through the process of enabling email notifications on checkins, ensuring that you’re always in the loop.

The Problem: Why Email Notifications Matter

Receiving notifications for each commit can be incredibly beneficial for several reasons:

• Awareness: You get immediate updates on what changes have been made, who made them, and why.
• Collaboration: Knowing what your teammates are working on can help avoid conflicts and improve collaboration.
• Accountability: Email notifications can hold team members accountable for their contributions and code quality.

Having this system in place can make managing your projects more streamlined and effective.

The Solution: Setting Up Post-Commit Hooks

To set up email notifications in SVN, you’ll need to use post-commit hooks. These are scripts that run automatically after a commit is made. Here’s how you can get started:

Step 1: Access Your SVN Repository

First, navigate to your SVN repository on the server where it’s hosted (in this case, your Linux server).

cd /path/to/your/repository/hooks

Step 2: Create or Edit the Post-Commit Hook

You will need to create or edit a post-commit hook script. This script defines what actions to take after a commit occurs.

1. Create a new file called post-commit in the hooks directory.

2. Make it executable so that it can run automatically:

   chmod +x post-commit
   

Step 3: Script for Sending Emails

You can use a Ruby script as a starting point for your post-commit hook. A commonly used script is commit-email.rb, which you can find here.

Sample Ruby Email Script

Here’s a simple example of what the content of your post-commit script could look like:

#!/bin/sh
REPOS="$1"
REV="$2"
SVNLOOK=/usr/bin/svnlook
SVN_EMAIL_SCRIPT=/path/to/your/commit-email.rb

$SVN_EMAIL_SCRIPT "$REPOS" "$REV"

Step 4: Configuring the Script

You’ll need to configure the commit-email.rb script to specify:

• The email recipients (distribution list).
• The format of the email (what information you want to include).

Make sure that your email system is set up correctly on the Linux server to send emails. You might need tools like sendmail or postfix for this.

Step 5: Testing the Setup

After you have configured the hook and the script, perform a test commit to check if the emails are sent out correctly. You can do this by committing a change in your codebase and then checking the inbox of the specified email recipients for new messages.

Conclusion

By following these steps, you can easily configure SVN to send email notifications on each commit using post-commit hooks. It’s a powerful feature that can enhance communication and collaboration within your team, helping everyone stay informed about the ongoing changes in the codebase.

Now, you can ensure that no commit goes unnoticed!