Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site ucsfcgl.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!bellcore!decvax!ucbvax!ucsfcgl!arnold From: arnold@ucsfcgl.UUCP (Ken Arnold%CGL) Newsgroups: net.unix,net.unix-wizards Subject: Re: RCS vs SCCS (RESULTS - LONG) Message-ID: <494@ucsfcgl.UUCP> Date: Wed, 8-May-85 20:53:25 EDT Article-I.D.: ucsfcgl.494 Posted: Wed May 8 20:53:25 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 11-May-85 01:10:20 EDT References: <269@osiris.UUCP> <308@osiris.UUCP> Reply-To: arnold@ucsfcgl.UUCP (PUT YOUR NAME HERE) Distribution: net Organization: UCSF Computer Graphics Lab Lines: 23 Xref: watmath net.unix:4470 net.unix-wizards:13115 Summary: >From: Craig Partridge > (3) RCS is faster. RCS stores diffs to take you back from the > most recent edition of the source. SCCS stores changes forward > from the first version. So in SCCS you wait a while for > your current file to retrieved. In RCS there is no wait. This is a common piece of misinformation. RCS does store backward delta's, i.e., it stores the current version intact, and has deltas backwards to get earlier version. However, SCCS does NOT store forward deltas from the original. It uses in-line deltas, giving a fixed one-pass overhead to get different deltas. Thus, getting the current version is slightly slower (I believe the figure is around 5% slower than RCS), but getting the version one delta back (for doing a diff, say), SCCS is faster by a small amount, and for anything more than one delta, SCCS is MUCH faster. In other words, to get a delta N deltas back from the top, it takes one pass for SCCS and N passes for RCS. None the less, I do prefer RCS, as you know if you read father into the summary to get my comments. This particular piece of "slander" against SCCS should be cleared up. It is unfortunate that RCS doesn't use this technique.