Subversion 1.5 released

Subversion 1.5 — the single largest post-1.0 release of Subversion — was released today. The long wait is over.

And boy do I mean "the long wait". Over two years have been invested into this release, with most of the effort surrounding the flagship feature it delivers — semi-automated tracking of merges. In that time we've added nine fantastic new full committers to the project, a handful of partial committers, and seen contributions from many other volunteers. And I've nothing but praise for Hyrum Wright, our unpaid, volunteer release manager, who patiently endured not just alpha and beta releases but eleven (yes, *sigh*, eleven) release candidates.

One personal benefit of this lengthy process has been the opportunity to speak publicly on the topic several times. From local LUGs and developer groups, to SubConf in Munich last October, to JavaOne CommunityOne last month in San Francisco, and in various blog posts and webinars, I've been able to talk about Subversion 1.5's new features and improvements. I'm not a particularly suave public speaker, but I was surprised to find that I wasn't nearly as nervous about doing these gigs as I thought I would be. But more importantly, each of these public appearances allows me to talk with other folks I've never met before and hear about their excitement around Subversion and the other tools in the Subversion ecosystem. In a few weeks, I'll be in London, speaking at the itSMF-BCS Conference, and once again talking about Subversion 1.5. But this time it will be different. This time, I can talk about the release in the past tense!

For the intimate details of what this Subversion 1.5 brings, what upgrading means in terms of compatibility matters, and so on, I refer you to the official release notes. Also, my employer (CollabNet) has a handy-dandy collection of Subversion-1.5-related documentation, webinars, training session, and other material available.

Subversion 1.5 with merge tracking is released. ALL YOUR BASE[LINE] ARE BELONG TO US