Seems like every day now someone asks me if I plan on moving Subtext over to CodePlex. I figure it would save me a lot of trouble if I just answer this question here once and for all.
Though of course I can’t answer once and for all. I can only answer for the here and now. And right now, I have thought about it, but have not strongly considered it for the following reasons.
Not Feeling the Pain
First of all, I am not really feeling a lot of pain with our current setup at SourceForge. We have CruiseControl.NET humming along nicely, a great build process, and are very happy with Subversion. Life is good, why should we change?
Also, we already made one switch from CVS to Subversion. To yet again switch source control systems is a big hassle. There would have to be a huge benefit to doing so to make it worthwhile. A minor benefit is not enough.
Source Control
As you know, I am a big fan of Subversion and TortoiseSVN. Source Control bindings in Visual Studio have been the biggest nightmare second only to Front Page extensions that I have had the pleasure to deal with. For example, I work with one client who uses Vault and another who uses Visual Source Safe. Switching between the two is such a pain in the rear as I have to remember to switch the SCC provider before I start working on one or the other.
As far as I am concerned, there is a big hump to overcome to get me comfortable with using SCC again. I understand that the Codeplex people are working on Turtle which is a TortoiseSVN like interface to CodePlex. When this is as solid as TortoiseSVN, perhaps we can talk.
Also, does Team System source control version renames and moves? That is a big plus in Subversion. Does it work over HTTPS? Are checkins atomic? Are branching and tagging fast? I haven’t looked into this and would love to know.
Source Control History
Can we import our Subversion history into Team System at CodePlex? Our version history is very important to us. At least to me. I would hate to lose that.
CruiseControl.NET
It is probably only a matter of time before someone writes a plugin for CruiseControl.NET that works with Team System. But this would be important to me. Now Simone tells me that Team System has something equivalent that would replace CCNET as part of CodePlex. If this is the case, then I would love to see details.
MbUnit
As you might also know, I love me some MbUnit. I made the switch from NUnit a while ago and have never looked back. If CodePlex has a CCNet replacement, will it integrate with MbUnit. I know Team System has its own unit test framework, but does it have the Rollback and RowTest attributes and a TypeFixture or equivalents? And if you tell me about its extensibility model and that I can write my own, I ask in response, why should I? I already have those things.
Summary
At this point, I would love to hear more details about CodePlex that address my concerns. Perhaps a demo video that shows me what we’re missing. But until these issues are addressed, or if all the other Subtext developers are chomping at the bit for CodePlex and threaten a mutiny if we do not switch over, I do not see any urgency or reason to switch now. Sometimes being bleeding edge just leaves you with a bloody mess.