CodePlex, TFS and Subversion

time to read 2 min | 227 words

Interestingly enough, Subversion support is the most requested feature for CodePlex. I suggest reading the discussion, it is very interesting. The major points against TFS and for SVN seems to be:

  • Weak offline access support
  • No patching
  • No anonymous access

The points above makes TFS a poor choice for an OSS project, which requires all three (but especially anonymous access and patching). For corporate scenarios, there is another advantage to Subversion over TFS. Subversion is a Zero Friction tool, TFS is anything but. A memorable quote can be found here:

Source control is a utility.  It's a tool.  It should help you do what you need and stay out of the way when it's not.  I love developer tools, which is probably why so many of my open source projects involve building new ones, but I firmly believe that if you have to ever think about the tool then the tool is not doing it's job.