Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcvax!ukc!axion!ist!dmg
From: dmg@ist.CO.UK (Dave McGlade)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: SCCS vs RCS
Summary: Major shortcomings of CM systems
Message-ID: <1874@istop.ist.CO.UK>
Date: 13 Jun 89 13:07:08 GMT
Organization: Imperial Software Technology, London, UK
Lines: 21

Both RCS and SCCS have two major shortcomings, in my humble opinion (what? !!)
Firstly, both require write access to the file containing old versions, 
(perhaps under some other user id).
This means that, potentially, I can corrupt old versions. 
From a project point of view, this is *BAD* news. Once
filed away as 'write only' an old version should not be corruptable without
forcing your resident guru to get out his code to access the disk as a
raw device :->

[In fact I used to accidentally corrupt s. files all the time when I tried
to save documents produced by CASE tools and have had to put some stuff 
on the front of SCCS to stop me checking in things that might corrupt 
the "s." files. ]

The second problem is like the first: the failure modes of SCCS/RCS should
ensure nothing wrecks my carefully built up history. I had a good case of
this recently when the disk filled up, screwed up the s. file and then carried
on to delete my original.

Dave McGlade
IST