CSSC FAQ

Welcome!

This is the FAQ list for the CSSC project. The most up-to-date copy of this file lives at http://cssc.sourceforge.net/faq.shtml

What is CSSC?

CSSC is a clone for the traditional Unix suite SCCS. SCCS is a proprietary program which is provided with most commercial versions of Unix. The various Free implementations of Unix lack this traditional feature.

Is there a web site for it?

Yes, the web site is at http://cssc.sourceforge.net/.

Why bother writing it?

SCCS has been available since at least 1980. In the time since then, many software development groups have used it at one time or another to control the development of software. However, if they want to continue to use SCCS, they're constrained to choose one of the various commercial versions of Unix.

Providing a Copylefted implementation of SCCS allows the various free Unices to compete on a level playing field. Since in other respects many of them provide excellent software development facilities this can be very helpful.

The actual early history of the development of CSSC is quite complex and so this is outlined in a separate page.

Should I use it?

Short answer: No.

If you have access to a genuine implemenatation of SCCS, the answer is "No". GNU CSSC is not yet complete and even if it were, it has not had the stringent testing that SCCS has had. SCCS has undergone almost twenty years of testing.

If you are using one of the versions of SCCS that has a Year 2000 problem, then the answer may change. All the major software vendors have announced operating system upgrades that are certified to be Year-2000 compliant. However, previous versions of these Unixes have often included versions of SCCS that do not work past the milennium turnover. If you can't or won't upgrade your vendor's implementation of SCCS, then using CSSC will at least get you through the year 2000 without mishap. There is much more information about the year-2000 compliance issues surrounding SCCS implementations in the CSSC manual, which comes with the source code.

If you do not have access to a commercial implementation of SCCS on your development system, and you must use SCCS, then I suggest that you do use CSSC.

However, if you're not forced to use SCCS there are many much better systems. CSSC is a clone of SCCS, and has all the same flaws as the original. Overall I'd reccomend using CVS even for a single developer, unless the number of files in the project you're controlling is exactly one, in which case I'd reccomend RCS.

The source code to CSSC itself is naturally not controlled with CSSC. After all, this would mean that a single bug in a development version of the program could destroy the package completely. I use CVS to aid my development of CSSC; its tagging facilities are particularly useful. The CVS repository for CSSC is not publicly accessible. In fact it is not even on the Internet; I have no Internet access at home.

Who maintains CSSC?

CSSC is currently being maintained by its author, James Youngman.

Is it finished yet?

No.

A usable - and large - subset of features is provided. Binary and text files are supported. Some infrequently-used features are missing, for example sccs-comb, sccs-val and the "-h" option of sccs-admin.

Who else has contributed to CSSC?

Many people have helped in all sorts of ways. A list of the people whose contributions have been recorded is here. Please let me know if you have contributed to CSSC but are missing from the credits list.

Where can I get CSSC from?

Since CSSC hasn't yet had a full public release, it is not on Project GNU's main release server. The current development version lives here

Is there an online manual for CSSC?

The CSSC manual is written in Texinfo, which can be converted to HTML automatically. Here is a version for which this has been done (this is updated daily from the CVS repository). daily from the CVS sources.

Is there a mailing list for CSSC?

Yes. To join it, please send

subscribe Your-Full-Name

to the cssc-users mailing list request address.

There is more than one mailing list for CSSC; further details are here.

How do I report bugs in CSSC?

Please visit the CSSC Bug Tracker.

What does "CSSC" stand for?

"Compatibly Stupid Source Control". Someone at the FSF suggested it, I don't know who it was.

I have installed CSSC, but Emacs's VC-mode doesn't work with it. What's the problem?

The CSSC programs (admin, get, prt, ...) install by default in /usr/local/libexec/cssc, you probably need to tell VC to search in this directory by setting the vc-path variable. This can be done by including the following line in your .emacs file:

(setq vc-path (list "/usr/local/libexec/cssc") )

(Thanks to Nicholas J Brealey for this item)