Comments on Insufficiently Random: The horrors of PVCS Version Manager

Even WORSE than PVCS is Serena Dimensions (AKA Dum...

2010-07-29T16:15:15.254-07:00

Even WORSE than PVCS is Serena Dimensions (AKA Dumbensions or Dementians). We're forced to use the web client because of our pinheaded management. This is the slowest POS I've ever used in my life. Think of a skeleton sitting in a chair while Dumbensions goes ca-chunka-chunka-chunka. I was happier with PVCS if that's possible...

You can work with Branches and Labels(Version Labe...

2010-07-20T09:00:08.971-07:00

You can work with Branches and Labels(Version Labels) on PVCS. :)

PVCS? Have features like ClearCase? Not really.

2010-06-08T11:00:16.536-07:00

PVCS? Have features like ClearCase? Not really.

I'm from a ClearCase background, recently join...

2010-06-08T10:43:04.050-07:00

I'm from a ClearCase background, recently joined a project and have to adapt to PVCS. It's reality, I've accepted it. Any advice? Is there any way to manage branches and labels like "Label Type's" and "Branch Type's" like ClearCase does?

Please help.

Git to the rescue!

2010-02-08T10:07:55.000-08:00

Git to the rescue!

Yup, worst tool ever. The only method available t...

2009-12-30T05:23:56.000-08:00

Yup, worst tool ever. The only method available to me to use PVCS is through their web service as well. I have had to manually track what files I touch and change so that I don't miss one when I commit it to the server. God forbid another developer changes the same file I am working on and I have to merge the files. *gasp*

I am amazed this thread is still alive.

2009-11-17T02:33:36.000-08:00

I am amazed this thread is still alive.

I can tell you how I fixed PVCS... I used the CVS...

2009-10-10T15:50:00.000-07:00

I can tell you how I fixed PVCS... I used the CVS server installed on our Red Hat machine to house and diff the code on a regular basis. I tag it during promotions, export the tag.. and check that into PVCS . The rest of my team just uses the CVS machine. Minimizing the pain is the only way I can use that POS system.

Far easier to just use the cvs server already installed on the machine than to beg for admins and bug tickets to be opened to fix it (if it can be fixed, I don't think most of it even can be). Everyone on my team has saved at least 5 hours a week for the last year by using an old version of CVS instead of PVCS.

I've been a S/W Configuration Manager for abou...

2009-09-03T06:53:03.000-07:00

I've been a S/W Configuration Manager for about as long as Software CM has existed, and over that time I have used/touched/demod about every VC tool in existence for just about every platform in existence. I have been forced to use PVCS VM for about half of my career and I can tell you that it is absolutely the worst tool that actually costs money. I have been challenged by more than one developer over the years who refused to believe that some of PVCS VM's horrendous limitations really exist.

For those of you who are stuck with it (as I am right now), I strongly suggest writing as much code as you can in the way of triggers to beef it up. Keep whispering "SubVersion is free" in your boss' ear when time comes to pay for maintenance......

Great review. This is by far the best PVCS manual ...

2009-08-24T14:13:14.000-07:00

Great review. This is by far the best PVCS manual ever written.
I HATE THIS TOOL

Our company has used Dimensions 8.x and 9.x. We ar...

2009-08-24T09:10:53.000-07:00

Our company has used Dimensions 8.x and 9.x. We are thinking of migrating to Subversion. Has anyone migrated from Dimensions to Subversion?

ClearCase is only as big as you want to make it. ...

2009-06-22T11:16:24.000-07:00

ClearCase is only as big as you want to make it. If it takes a long time to deploy it is because your admins simply don't understand it. I have been a ClearCase admin for a few years now and I can get a team up and running in less than a day - usually a few hours.

Tony mentioned config specs being difficult. Not sure what to say there as I've never had any issues but then developers today don't use make or ant files much either. They just want a GUI to tell them what to do... If you are really afraid of config specs simply use a snapshot view much like CVS or Subversion.

And yes, PVCS/Version Manager is still quite horrid.

2009, Dimensions 10. still sucks. :( The fundament...

2009-01-12T04:39:26.000-08:00

2009, Dimensions 10. still sucks. :( The fundamentals of the product are unsound. It's possibly great for managers, but for a developer's day to day work it's generally a hinderance, taking more than a comparable SCM to tweak in order for it to be decently usable.

A lot has been said about the shortcomings of Dime...

2008-11-07T07:25:50.000-08:00

A lot has been said about the shortcomings of Dimensions and the shortcomings of the development teams using it. I think both points are valid. I would rather have a knowledgeable CM staff than the best CM tool on the market but the tool quality does make a big difference. In fact, you could say that the lower the quality of the tools the more knowledge is required of the developers to use/workaround it properly. I think Dimensions could be used to provide rudimentary change management but the amount of expertise required to institutionalize the use of Dimensions is such that most teams will realize the need for a better tool before they would choose to make Dimensions work.

It has been very encouraging reading many of these posts because I work with a group of people who know that Dimensions sucks but don't quite know why. I'm glad somebody is documenting the why for us all.

Years after still good reading :)

http://ma...

2008-08-19T19:03:22.000-07:00

Years after still good reading :)

http://maillist.perforce.com/pipermail/perforce-user/2007-March/021177.html

Where I work, we have Dimensions 9.x (not sure of ...

2008-04-16T02:50:07.000-07:00

Where I work, we have Dimensions 9.x (not sure of exact point release; either 9.0 or 9.1 I think).
Our small development team (9 dev, plus tech mgr, and part-time PM) have been using CVS for about 10 yrs
even though the company IT's "official" tool of choice is Dimensions. They let us get away with using
Dimensions for only release mgmt as long as we place a gzipped tarball into Dimensions for each release.
Several of us on team are dinosaurs in the sense we prefer a code text editor (e.g., vim, emacs)
and *nix shell over IDEs, but our tech mgr has "decreed" that from henceforth we shall convert everything
to Dimensions and no longer use CVS.

Can anyone comment on whether any of these problems with Dimenions mentioned in this blog are still
present in release 9.x? If there are still such issues, our mgr may listen to such things. I already
know that Dimensions is very convoluted (to say the least), but figure much of that can be addressed
with appropriate shell wrappers. But I don't want to also have to try to make up for it's shortcomings
of the sort pointed out in this blog. It might be better just to change companies.

-kevin

http://www.earth.li/~noodles/pvcs-sucks.html

2008-04-09T20:54:52.000-07:00

http://www.earth.li/~noodles/pvcs-sucks.html

Frank

I am amazed someone still uses it.

2008-04-09T20:44:20.000-07:00

Frank

I am amazed someone still uses it.

I get the feeling the pvcs development team is ast...

2008-03-20T06:43:20.000-07:00

I get the feeling the pvcs development team is astroturfing here. pvcs has been an utter disaster on our project. we consistently get out of memory when doing a "get" on the entire repository with the GUI. no way to to "get latest" without downloading all files. can't promote a file while it is checked out. GUI routinely crashes. workspaces disappear at times -- unexplicately. impossibly slow. doesn't work over vpn with domain authentication. I could go on and on. and our experience is consistent with other teams. I can't imagine anyone is buying this software anymore. hopefully it will just disappear over time for the good of humanity.

Monarch,

I am very satisfied with perforce ...

2008-03-13T01:56:22.000-07:00

Monarch,

I am very satisfied with perforce - very cool product, and I liked the subversion. ClearCase may be my third choice however I am well aware that it is overpriced and well too "big".

Boris I'm not certain at this point that you w...

2008-02-11T06:56:45.000-08:00

Boris I'm not certain at this point that you would be satisfied with ANY commercial version control system. Thanks for the drama though, good read.

How many active branches can PVCS support sensibly...

2008-01-31T02:38:31.000-08:00

How many active branches can PVCS support sensibly?

Coop,

I like PVCS a lot. I know some people...

2007-11-19T07:39:57.000-08:00

Coop,

I like PVCS a lot. I know some people they just would like to put down what they don't know. I have used ClearCase recently, and I tell you, it might be a powerful tool, but it is very cumbersome to manage and adminster. To set it up, it took us over a year to get it to be installed on unix, and 9 months to get it installed on windows. The config spec is very confusing, and you can make many mistakes with that. On the other hand, PVCS VM can be easily setup with the File Server option which provides you easily with capability of accessing it from unix or windows. In a day, I was able to set up PVCS to be accessed on Unix and Windows without the need to purchase an interop solution. Try to do that with ClearCase.

I am sure if you have been using clearCase for 5 years or more, and haven't used any other tool, then you have tunnel vision, and lack exposure. May be once ClearCase is setup, and you have been using it for many years as a developer, then you might like it. We were having issues with ClearCase all the times. I am so glad I am away from that environment for now. I would say keep an open eye.

Coop, you wrote the following before about PVCS:
4. Too much merging - I can merge any conflicts that occur. PVCS is only spotting the files/directories that need merging.

This indicates to me that you can merge all files on branch to a trunk. Serena support informed me that is not possible!!! you can only do it one file at a time!!! can you please share with me how you merge branched files to the trunk (mass merge), like ClearCase? That is onething I know clearCase does well.

Thanks

If all points you ask of, are relevant to your tea...

2007-05-22T20:28:10.000-07:00

If all points you ask of, are relevant to your team than run away from PVCS as fast as you can.

I tend to agree with Coop about using the right to...

2007-05-01T15:18:03.000-07:00

I tend to agree with Coop about using the right tool for the right application and the potential issue with the PVCS admin (very likely). Even Clearcase can be a mess if there is no good admin for it. However, like many other said, is the tool so EASY/LESS MANUAL WORK to use that everyone in your team knows how to use it, or it is good because everyone in your team is good enough to work around any potential issue? Or you build your own customized inteface tool to shield everyone from "screwing" up things? I just started to use PVCS (not voluntarily of course), and the concept of code promoted from one active branch to the "root" will affect the rest of the active branches (like branching is not really branching), and the whole work-around required on adding/deleting files really puzzles me. And I also see other problems that require MANUAL work as well. Of course, it could be due to my limited knowledge of PVCS. The funny thing, within the same timeframe, I don't have this issue when I look at the Clearcase version tree, as well as the EASY, STRAIGHTFORWARD commands that come with it. In my personal opinion, tools should be easy and straightforward to use and requires less workaround. I have no interest in proving myself about solving PVCS creatively, nor I want my developers to. It is always about how it helps us as easily as possible. Anyway, I guess to really understand why you like it, what is the nature of your team? Do you guys have:
1) Many projects within the team
2) A project with many active branches
3) How many files within a project
4) Are files constantly updated, deleted, and added, refactored?
5) Are there a lot of dependencies between each file?
6) Do you have lib or jar files that are constantly upgraded within different branches?

Any input will be greatly appreciated.

Comments on Insufficiently Random: The horrors of PVCS Version Manager

Even WORSE than PVCS is Serena Dimensions (AKA Dum...

You can work with Branches and Labels(Version Labe...

PVCS? Have features like ClearCase? Not really.

I'm from a ClearCase background, recently join...

Git to the rescue!

Yup, worst tool ever. The only method available t...

I am amazed this thread is still alive.

I can tell you how I fixed PVCS... I used the CVS...

I've been a S/W Configuration Manager for abou...

Great review. This is by far the best PVCS manual ...

Our company has used Dimensions 8.x and 9.x. We ar...

ClearCase is only as big as you want to make it. ...

2009, Dimensions 10. still sucks. :( The fundament...

A lot has been said about the shortcomings of Dime...

Years after still good reading :)http://ma...

Where I work, we have Dimensions 9.x (not sure of ...

http://www.earth.li/~noodles/pvcs-sucks.html

FrankI am amazed someone still uses it.

I get the feeling the pvcs development team is ast...

Monarch,I am very satisfied with perforce ...

Boris I'm not certain at this point that you w...

How many active branches can PVCS support sensibly...

Coop,I like PVCS a lot. I know some people...

If all points you ask of, are relevant to your tea...

I tend to agree with Coop about using the right to...

Years after still good reading :)

http://ma...

Frank

I am amazed someone still uses it.

Monarch,

I am very satisfied with perforce ...

Coop,

I like PVCS a lot. I know some people...