2.9 Remote repositories

Your working copy of the sources can be on a different machine than the repository. Using CVS in this manner is known as client/server operation. You run CVS on a machine which can mount your working directory, known as the client, and tell it to communicate to a machine which can mount the repository, known as the server. Generally, using a remote repository is just like using a local one, except that the format of the repository name is:

[:method:][[user][:password]@]hostname[:[port]]/path/to/repository

Specifying a password in the repository name is not recommended during checkout, since this will cause CVS to store a cleartext copy of the password in each created directory. cvs login first instead (see section Using the client with password authentication).

The details of exactly what needs to be set up depend on how you are connecting to the server.

If method is not specified, and the repository name contains ‘:’, then the default is ext or server, depending on your platform; both are described in Connecting with rsh.