beta.blog

This article covers installing subversion with the apache module, allowing users to easily access it via a public network like the internet. The setup requirements include a working installation of apache2 on your server.

If apache2 is not installed on your machine, you can install it using:

apt-get install apache2

Ok, now let’s install subversion:

sudo apt-get install subversion libapache2-svn -y --force-yes

I’m going to save my subversion repository to /svn

svnadmin create /svn

Now the svn configuration should be adjusted, thus I’m going to edit dav_svn.conf :

vi /etc/apache2/mods-enabled/dav_svn.conf

Uncomment the most important elements:

<Location /svn>
DAV svn
SVNPath /svn
...
AuthType Basic
AuthName "Subversion Repository"
AuthUserFile /etc/apache2/dav_svn.passwd
...
Require valid-user
</Location>

It will save the subversion repository to /svn, apply a basic authentification scheme and require a valid user (no anonymous logins will be possible).

Now create your first user which later will be used to access the subversion repository:

htpasswd -cm /etc/apache2/dav_svn.passwd beta

The username I chose was beta. It will prompt you to enter a password as well. I recommend using only the -m switch after adding your first user. This way it won’t re-create the entire file whenever you add a new user.

After adding the users you’ve to restart apache:

/etc/init.d/apache2 restart

Now you should be able to reach your subversion repository going to http://www.yourwebsite.com/svn